This is one of the most fun reading I’ve done recently. I think I saw it mentioned in BusinessWeek. The words that caught my interest was “gambling”, “stock market”, and “Claude Shannon“. Especially Late Dr. Shannon. Ever since I got involved in video and audio codec works, I’ve been interested in finding more about the man who invented a field of science, Information Theory, which brought forth all the digital communication we enjoy today.

Although Dr. Shannon is one of the principal characters in Mr. Poundstone’s non-technical (more of historical narrative) book, it’s really the “Kelly’s Criteria” which was formulated by a Texas physician, John L. Kelly, Jr., that is at the center. The formula gives a guide to how much of one’s bankroll to bet given the odd and the “edge” you have (his assertion was it should be edge/odd).

At its opposite at the center, is the “Efficient Market Theory” which is (I believe) still prevailing in the economic and financial circle. This theory states that the market is so efficient that no one can have an edge and exploit it.

And another main character is Ed Thorp who was a math Ph.D when he wrote one of the first to publish a blackjack card counting system. Using the Kelly’s criteria, he was able to maximize his earnings in blackjack (which got him banned in many casinos). Then, he found something better than blackjack when he was a professor at U.C. Irvine: stock market. Using math and computers, he was able to exploit the small (and probably temporary) inefficiencies that can be found in the market.

Anyway, it’s a fun reading. I can see that in a long term, the market will correct itself. However, I also think that there are always small localized “anomalies” in any complex system (e.g., matter and anti-matter briefly appearing out of “empty” space). Although I won’t be able to really make use of the Kelly’s criteria, but it sure was fun to read about mafia, casinos, and stock market.

The bustling, 500-stall private market on Pyongyang’s Tong Il Street … where North Koreans can now buy everything from food to pirated videocassettes of South Korean soap operas …

I find this very promising although the article discusses about whether the current Bush Administration’s hard-line wait-till-it-implodes attitude will every work. Not that I don’t think so, but I found it extremely interesting and promising that the foreign observers were able to see that pirated South Korean TV shows were circulated.

On one hand, I think it’s hopeful that this can be used to bridge some of the cultural gaps between the two Koreas. But on the other hand, I am worried that all the twisted problems that some of the soap operas portray would be all that North Koreans think of the South.

I am really glad that the economic situation in North Korea is getting better. It’s always nice to have non-desperate people as your neighbor.

Somehow I am not that surprised about the female excelling in school. Even for less “macho”/”aggressive” society such as Korea, I’ve often heard that girls are better at school work than boys. I guess the difference between two societies is that, in Korea, everyone (I mean everyone) knows, from very early on, that a diploma from a good college is a must for your future. Also, in Korea, being good at academics isn’t a liability for boys (actually, often quite an opposite).

However, what surprised me was that Ritalin was prescribed to so many boys and that it is sometimes forced.

He is four times as likely to be diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. That often leads to being forced to take Ritalin or risk being expelled, sent to special ed, or having parents accused of negligence. One study of public schools in Fairfax County, Va., found that more than 20% of upper-middle-class white boys were taking Ritalin-like drugs by fifth grade.

I just don’t get the notion that most Americans seem to have that you can take an easy way out by “fixing” things by medication, especially with mood or personality altering stuff. Physical violence is bad, but this is?

It’s such an idea that fascinates me and in some aspects makes me “happy”. I was somehow dissatisfied by the notion that what we are based on only depends on the sequences in these 46 chromosomes, just like a deterministic program would be. Of course, they can bring a complex variation, but still the thought of a single class of agents determining the whole system in the real world sounded too simple to be true.