As I go through life I find strange parallels. I am not in anyway a mystic and view such things with a healthy (in my view) scepticism. It was thus with a little surprise that I found myself using a metaphor I recognised, from old oriental teachings, when I was trying to define how to get things done. I had in my mind a colleague who had a negative outlook and who could find the objections to anything. I was trying to classify the differences between this attitude and my own as I thrive on problems people claim are impossible.
I started by thinking about the fact that I am happy to throw out ideas even if they are a shade ridiculous. Occasionally one of these ideas, when examined closely, will be practical despite being ridiculous. It will approach things from a different angle. Once you have seen how it might work you explore all around it and you either end up with a new approach, or more likely a set of objections. You then look for ways of getting around all of the objections. Sometimes this will kill the idea off and you go back to throwing out ideas, but sometimes you will manage all of the objections, and in the process develop a new view and a new approach that makes the whole thing look obvious.
The analogy I saw was of a vessel to contain water. Let's imagine one of those stone ponds the Japanese supposedly have in their gardens. The pond has great workmanship to make it water tight. The water does not think "this is a watertight pond, let's give up" it just seeps into anywhere it can. Most of the cracks and crevices will not go anywhere, but it fills them anyway. If there is a route through it will try to fill that too, and end up leaking very slowly out through it. The leaking will slowly wear away at the sides and, ever so slowly, widen the path. In the end you will have a hole so large you cannot see how it could ever have been thought of as water tight. This is the process for doing the seemingly impossible.
I thought about this for a while and was struck by the tie up with many philosophies. Then today I was looking at an article about getting things done and noticed it had the phrase "mind like water". On first glance it seemed to be using it quite differently, but looking closer I am not sure that it really is.
He is talking about 'the ready state of the martial artist, poised and stress-free" and goes on to suggest that “Your ability to generate power is directly proportional to your ability to relax,”. If you think about it the water simply relaxes into the shape available and everything else follows. A less relaxed substance like earth would never make it out.
This could all be just coincidence, but I like to think that I am just seeing the same things as others because I am looking at the same sorts of people doing the same things. Human nature is probably much the same regardless of geography and chronology.
Rufus Evison
Monday, 23 June 2008
Wednesday, 18 June 2008
Children: a corollary on automation
First time you do something for your child you just do it.
Second time you show them how to do it for themselves.
third time you ask them to do it for you.
Second time you show them how to do it for themselves.
third time you ask them to do it for you.
Monday, 16 June 2008
When to automate...
The first time you have to do something just do it.
The second time you have to do something think about how to do it with less effort or automatically.
The third time don't do it, automate it and get it done for you.
RufusM Evison
The second time you have to do something think about how to do it with less effort or automatically.
The third time don't do it, automate it and get it done for you.
RufusM Evison
Tuesday, 22 January 2008
Privacy Online
I was just working on something completely unrelated when it was forced home upon me how little online privacy there is. I came across a snippet of information in my web analytics that told me that someone who works for Threshers is researching a certain view of someone who works for Marks and Spencers. I will not go into any more detail about this view, just that while I do not know either of the people involved I could possibly have relations with either in a work context. It seems almost frightening that in the course of my work, which is actually potentially related to both of these companies I could see things that neither party thinks has been made public.
I already knew that when you do anything online you leave a trail of breadcrumbs behind you. These allow people to follow you around if they want to do so. So why does it surprise me that these facts come to light? It surprised me because it is a concrete example where before I only had hypothetical examples.
Hypothetically you might be looking for a way to get back at a neighbour and so you might search for "bad things neighbour's-name" and then find a site which talks about your neighbour in a good way. You then leave, but your neighbour’s friend who runs the site sees the search engine term and goes to your neighbour and tells him that this referral occurred. Worse than that you searched from work and your company name was on the request. Your neighbour knows where you work. Now your neighbour can probably guess it was you. Small world online isn't it?
Things can get worse however. The site owner is a curious type and does a Google for the same terms and cannot see his site. He wonders how you came to be there and perseveres a bit. He discovers that for these terms he ranks 153 in the rankings and realises that to get there would involve paging though 16 pages of search results (standard config, it could be less pages if there are more results per page). That shows a certain amount of determination and implies strong feelings on behalf of the searcher. He can also see the snippet Google shows and realise that by this time you were clutching at straws. So now your neighbour knows you hate him with a vengeance (or were just drunk and stupid?). A little innocent web analytics has revealed something quite personal to someone you did not really want to know.
It all sounds pretty unlikely, far fetched and a bit of a stretch. Far fetched though it is, this is the equivalent of what has just happened. Given the snippet I have seen I am not going to take any action based on what I saw, but I could. I am an amiable sort, not given to giving people black looks, but if I were to give someone a look of hatred you can rest assured i would be looking over my shoulder first.
I already knew that when you do anything online you leave a trail of breadcrumbs behind you. These allow people to follow you around if they want to do so. So why does it surprise me that these facts come to light? It surprised me because it is a concrete example where before I only had hypothetical examples.
Hypothetically you might be looking for a way to get back at a neighbour and so you might search for "bad things neighbour's-name" and then find a site which talks about your neighbour in a good way. You then leave, but your neighbour’s friend who runs the site sees the search engine term and goes to your neighbour and tells him that this referral occurred. Worse than that you searched from work and your company name was on the request. Your neighbour knows where you work. Now your neighbour can probably guess it was you. Small world online isn't it?
Things can get worse however. The site owner is a curious type and does a Google for the same terms and cannot see his site. He wonders how you came to be there and perseveres a bit. He discovers that for these terms he ranks 153 in the rankings and realises that to get there would involve paging though 16 pages of search results (standard config, it could be less pages if there are more results per page). That shows a certain amount of determination and implies strong feelings on behalf of the searcher. He can also see the snippet Google shows and realise that by this time you were clutching at straws. So now your neighbour knows you hate him with a vengeance (or were just drunk and stupid?). A little innocent web analytics has revealed something quite personal to someone you did not really want to know.
It all sounds pretty unlikely, far fetched and a bit of a stretch. Far fetched though it is, this is the equivalent of what has just happened. Given the snippet I have seen I am not going to take any action based on what I saw, but I could. I am an amiable sort, not given to giving people black looks, but if I were to give someone a look of hatred you can rest assured i would be looking over my shoulder first.
Thursday, 1 November 2007
Posts to Post
Given that I seem to be fairly under pressure for time to write this blog and equally that I am beginning to get requests for particular articles I thought it might be appropriate to publish some possibilities. These are a few topics/articles I will be considering writing in the future. If you want anything added or have any feelings on anything on the list let me know. In the unlikely event you cannot figure out how to get in touch with me otherwise then just post a comment. I do enjoy researching real problems so do not feel shy.
DNA Data Base Articles
I will probably write a few more articles about how DNA matching works, how DNA evidence works, how DNA evidence can and should be used why the DNA database can't work. Any queries on particular questions just let me know and I will address them.
Privacy and Data
As I spend most of my life gathering data in the latest ways I feel it is at least partly my responsibility to lead the way around ethics and data management. I am bound to write a few articles on what would and would not seem reasonable with combining and using personal and aggregate data. I may also write something on how such data can and should be obtained and a few ways that data should not be gathered.
Online Branding
Given my experiments in this area and the fact that I seem to have an aptitude for SEO, web analytics and related matters I will probably write a few articles on any of these as and when they seem interesting. For example would anyone be interested in something on SEO for mobile or in how online branding interacts with search online and how this is not the same on mobile.
Media Integration
This is the whole cross platform, cross channel integration issue. Online and Mobile are just digital channels and as such should be treated like any other channels. The problem with this argument is that currently most channels live in silos and are not integrated. They should be tied together so that they can help each other. I have done a fair amount of work in this area, one way and another, so if I can think what people might like to know I shall write about that. If not I shall just rant about why it works and is the way things should be done.
Breast feeding
This one was by request. I have very little in the way of solid results so far. Claims seem to include health intelligence, immunity and almost anything else you can imagine. People often refer to research abut are rarely willing to allow it to be subject to scrutiny. There will be more on this as I get hold of the original research.
Terrorism and Risk
There is so much poor understanding of this that we are willing to take terrible risks to avoid smaller risks. You are five times more likely to be struck by lightening than to be killed by terrorism in the UK. Despite this I receive phone calls from market researchers asking me whether I am worried about travelling because of terrorism. No one asks whether I am worried about travelling because of Lightning. In fact the statistic above is massively inflated. To get it down to only five times as likely I had to select enough years to include the bus bombings. I then had to make sure my sample time did not go any further back or terrorism became to remote a possibility to compare with lightning strike. At some point I will write this and a few similar things down and then wonder whether to laugh or cry.
Gender Stereotyping
Another one I have been asked to look at. I have found a few amusing examples and really ought to write something about this soon.
Education
A subject close to my heart. Whether I will write about problems that exist or ways we might help remains to be seen. I feel too strongly about education to write much on this as I would hate to risk biased reporting.
DNA Data Base Articles
I will probably write a few more articles about how DNA matching works, how DNA evidence works, how DNA evidence can and should be used why the DNA database can't work. Any queries on particular questions just let me know and I will address them.
Privacy and Data
As I spend most of my life gathering data in the latest ways I feel it is at least partly my responsibility to lead the way around ethics and data management. I am bound to write a few articles on what would and would not seem reasonable with combining and using personal and aggregate data. I may also write something on how such data can and should be obtained and a few ways that data should not be gathered.
Online Branding
Given my experiments in this area and the fact that I seem to have an aptitude for SEO, web analytics and related matters I will probably write a few articles on any of these as and when they seem interesting. For example would anyone be interested in something on SEO for mobile or in how online branding interacts with search online and how this is not the same on mobile.
Media Integration
This is the whole cross platform, cross channel integration issue. Online and Mobile are just digital channels and as such should be treated like any other channels. The problem with this argument is that currently most channels live in silos and are not integrated. They should be tied together so that they can help each other. I have done a fair amount of work in this area, one way and another, so if I can think what people might like to know I shall write about that. If not I shall just rant about why it works and is the way things should be done.
Breast feeding
This one was by request. I have very little in the way of solid results so far. Claims seem to include health intelligence, immunity and almost anything else you can imagine. People often refer to research abut are rarely willing to allow it to be subject to scrutiny. There will be more on this as I get hold of the original research.
Terrorism and Risk
There is so much poor understanding of this that we are willing to take terrible risks to avoid smaller risks. You are five times more likely to be struck by lightening than to be killed by terrorism in the UK. Despite this I receive phone calls from market researchers asking me whether I am worried about travelling because of terrorism. No one asks whether I am worried about travelling because of Lightning. In fact the statistic above is massively inflated. To get it down to only five times as likely I had to select enough years to include the bus bombings. I then had to make sure my sample time did not go any further back or terrorism became to remote a possibility to compare with lightning strike. At some point I will write this and a few similar things down and then wonder whether to laugh or cry.
Gender Stereotyping
Another one I have been asked to look at. I have found a few amusing examples and really ought to write something about this soon.
Education
A subject close to my heart. Whether I will write about problems that exist or ways we might help remains to be seen. I feel too strongly about education to write much on this as I would hate to risk biased reporting.
Monday, 22 October 2007
Take the pressure off mums!
There is little question that while you are breast feeding (if you decide to breast feed) then some of your immunity to sniffles and so forth is passed on to the child. So there is a benefit in terms of the parent not having to deal with and worry about sniffles.
The question is whether, in countries with good hygiene and decent food, there is a significant difference to the child, whether in terms of survival or in terms of freedom from disabilities and serious disease.
A huge amount of pressure is put on educated and well off people to breast feed. The NCT classes imply that doing anything else is not normal. The breast feeding counsellors imply it is close to negligence. There is a government directive to support breast feeding and even the milk formula companies have to carry notices recommending it.
My observations suggest that those with less money or less education are not exposed to nearly as much of this propaganda. This may not be true, and the pressure may be on everyone. Certainly some or all women are made to feel as if not breast feeding is a failure to be a good mother.
Given my anecdotal experience it looks as if this pressure is unjustified. I have been asked to find out by one mother whether this is the case.
A preliminary search has turned up an epidemiological study from 2004 which suggests there is a relationship between SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) and bottle feeding. After my previous experience with the SIDS research this will need a lot of careful examination.
Almost all SIDS related behaviours are tied to lower socio-economic or socio-demographic status. Where this is the case an epidemiological study must by its nature pick up a lot of potentially false signs. At least one government/FSIDs recommendation is not supported by their research, but seems like a good recommendation to make anyway. So the question comes down to is this pressure unjustified, and if so should we take the pressure off the mums?
Rufus Evison
P.S. Manuella who requested I look into this should get all the credit.
The question is whether, in countries with good hygiene and decent food, there is a significant difference to the child, whether in terms of survival or in terms of freedom from disabilities and serious disease.
A huge amount of pressure is put on educated and well off people to breast feed. The NCT classes imply that doing anything else is not normal. The breast feeding counsellors imply it is close to negligence. There is a government directive to support breast feeding and even the milk formula companies have to carry notices recommending it.
My observations suggest that those with less money or less education are not exposed to nearly as much of this propaganda. This may not be true, and the pressure may be on everyone. Certainly some or all women are made to feel as if not breast feeding is a failure to be a good mother.
Given my anecdotal experience it looks as if this pressure is unjustified. I have been asked to find out by one mother whether this is the case.
A preliminary search has turned up an epidemiological study from 2004 which suggests there is a relationship between SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) and bottle feeding. After my previous experience with the SIDS research this will need a lot of careful examination.
Almost all SIDS related behaviours are tied to lower socio-economic or socio-demographic status. Where this is the case an epidemiological study must by its nature pick up a lot of potentially false signs. At least one government/FSIDs recommendation is not supported by their research, but seems like a good recommendation to make anyway. So the question comes down to is this pressure unjustified, and if so should we take the pressure off the mums?
Rufus Evison
P.S. Manuella who requested I look into this should get all the credit.
Sunday, 14 October 2007
How DNA Matching works (without the technical bits)
I have been asked about this by a number of people. The problem seems to be that everyone knows our DNA is unique (we are all individuals) and so how can we possibly have a DNA match with someone else?
The answer is that DNA testing does not examine the whole of our DNA. DNA is made up of around 220 million base pairs. If we were to compare all of these we would have a unique genetic fingerprint. INstead we compare 20 different tiny areas of the DNA and see if they match.
This is a bit like taking a physical person (also unique) and then takign a set of details about them to compare. It will quickly get rid of a large number of people who do nto match, and it might happen to be unique. How many long haired six foot blonds are there with a mole at the top of their inner thigh and two gold teeth? Probably not very many, and possibly only me.
The problem arises when you take large numbers of people as some of them will have ambiguous descriptions. The same is true with genetic matching. The bits do not necessarily match to anything obvious to look at (my gold teeth do not show up on a DNA test, so that seems fair), but might match to someone else's sequence.
Given the possibility of matches there is also a possibility of accidental matches. This is where my post about the combinatorics of the DNA database and how it leads to the probability of innocent people getting in trouble becomes important.
Rufus Evison
The answer is that DNA testing does not examine the whole of our DNA. DNA is made up of around 220 million base pairs. If we were to compare all of these we would have a unique genetic fingerprint. INstead we compare 20 different tiny areas of the DNA and see if they match.
This is a bit like taking a physical person (also unique) and then takign a set of details about them to compare. It will quickly get rid of a large number of people who do nto match, and it might happen to be unique. How many long haired six foot blonds are there with a mole at the top of their inner thigh and two gold teeth? Probably not very many, and possibly only me.
The problem arises when you take large numbers of people as some of them will have ambiguous descriptions. The same is true with genetic matching. The bits do not necessarily match to anything obvious to look at (my gold teeth do not show up on a DNA test, so that seems fair), but might match to someone else's sequence.
Given the possibility of matches there is also a possibility of accidental matches. This is where my post about the combinatorics of the DNA database and how it leads to the probability of innocent people getting in trouble becomes important.
Rufus Evison
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