Homework #4

I found my picks on Intrade.com. The sections I chose from are: Legal, Politics,  and Science.

The first pick is for Barrack Obama to be the democratic nominee. This costs $8.30 per share and I choose to buy 48 shares for $398.40

The second pick is for the democratic party to win the presidential election. This costs $6.19 per share and I choose to buy 64 shares for a total of $396.16

The third pick is for Romney to be the republican candidate. This costs $3.24 per share and I choose to buy 30 shares for a total of $97.20

The fourth pick is for the Higgs particle to be discovered before Dec 31, 2013. This costs $1.50 per share and I choose to buy 33 shares for $49.50

The fifth pick is for california to legalize marijuana in the November 2010 ballot. This costs $4.02 per share and I choose to buy 14 shares at $56.28

Homework #3

The delphi method of solving problems uses group knowledge to get an estimate of when something will happen in the future. When this method was preformed on my idea the range went down significantly and the the median also went up considerably. This means that after discussion the group agreed that the population would not increase to a point where a birth control program would be instated for a long time.

Homework #2

"Mr. and Mrs. Future, The board of World Population Commision regets to inform you that your application for child birth has been denied on account of a genetic mutation in the Y-chromosone. Any attempt to bypass your artificial operating system will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. In your particular case, there are available medical operations that could possibly fix your mutation. Another option would be to adopt. We apologize if this news is upsetting to you, but this process is in place for the betterment of humanity now and in the future."

This idea is not really that far off. One of the smartest people in the world, Chris Langen, once said that if he was in charge he would implement a world wide birth control program in order to control population and prevent over population.

The world's current growth rate is about 1.3%, representing a doubling time of 54 years. We can expect the world's population of approximately 6 billion to become 12 billion by 2054 if the current rate of growth continues. It has been said that our earth can support life up to 15 billion people. In that case we will see a major population problem within this century barring a large-scale war and / or disease. There are many moral and ethical issues deep rooted in this idea, but the future of humanity depends upon such a program.