关于全球化如何定义及怎样看待，在地理学和经济学中都有众多的定义，众说纷纭而莫衷一是。全球化的推动者们认为全球化的图景就是一个完全竞争、国界消失的全球经济，而且这一图景的到来不可避免；全球化的反对者则认为全球化带来的是身份认同和选择的消失。但事实上，这些对全球化的阐释并没有忠实地反映当前被人们认知为“全球化”的现象。在今天的全球化中，充分的竞争由于掌握大量体制和经济资源的跨国公司的存在而不能实现，而跨国公司为了占领本地市场，也必须强调其产品和服务随当地文化而变通的灵活性，民族身份认同不是被取消，而是得到了加强。
如何看待这样的全球化及其成因决定了我们将如何适应和推动/阻止全球化。Herod 首先从地理学的角度，提出经济（Economy）是一个空间过程，而不同于传统经济学使用的仅考虑劳动、薪酬和租金成本与收入的立即交换的模型。通过承认经济是一个空间过程，读者可以开始理解通讯和运输技术给产品和服务的交换带来的改变，即地理如何影响资本主义经济以及相关的社会结构，更重要的是，经济的社会构建如何影响社会的地理关系。经济因此是一个受空间关系影响的、动态的社会产物。
这是理解本书需要掌握的关键结论。在第一章提出这个观点后，作者开始从全球化的视野、阐释和叙事的角度来阐释全球化这一概念的形成过程。作者指出，西方的地理大发现，以及随之而来的远洋航行和殖民史决定了西方国家在制订全球的空间（北向上的地图）以及时间（国际日期变更线）方面的主导作用。这些优势是商业发达的西方获得的先发优势，但据此认为一个统一的全球市场是全球经济唯一的未来是武断的。首先，技术的进步并不能说明全球化的不可避免，可以看作推动了全球化进程的事件在我们熟知的许多技术发明之前就已存在；其次，全球化也不是一个步调统一的过程，认为统一的全球市场必然出现是忽视了空间差异性的结果。这部分的论证是书中的第2--4章。
第4章之后，Herod 又各用一章的篇幅，讨论了殖民时代的地理遗产对形成新经济关系的作用，制造业和 FDI 与全球化，民族国家与全球化，以及劳工和劳工组织的全球化。但以我之见，这几章鲜明的历史色彩表明了它们的真正作用还是作为第4章提出的“全球化并不新鲜”这个观点的注脚。Herod 在这几章里想要说明的观点，是我们在今天的全球化中观察到的现象，有的并不像人们想象的那样减少了民族国家的控制，或者只是一个更大的历史周期的一部分。因此那些认为全球化不可避免的观点是站不住脚的。全球这个尺度，乃至于全球化本身，都是人们在经济研究和社会生活中人为建构的概念。
作者的根本目的，在于批评新自由主义对全球化的构建。不可否认，即使是左派的反对全球化的人群，有时也不免落入新自由主义叙事的窠臼，反对的是新自由主义看作是不可避免的未来的那个全球化。Herod 要提醒读者的是，新的物质流动过程在以新的方式把这个世界联系在一起，而我们如何看待这个新过程，取决于我们采用什么样的历史和地理观，以及怎样划分人类历史的各阶段。更重要的是，读者要认识到全球化的主流叙事来自于信息发达的北方世界，学会辨别新自由主义的全球化观念，并理解这种地理学对于世界经济关系的构建的作用，才能正确理解新的经济过程和这个过程中全球公正的实现。
It is the time to make the New Year's resolutions again. In the first
part, I will follow the common practice and make a list of things I
want to achieve in the year 2010:
- I will write more notes and more sensible blog entries;
- I will use twitter better;
- I will read with better-defined purposes;
- I will be more efficient at work;
- I will spend more time with family;
- I will cultivate one of my hobbies and try to become a guru on it;
- I will use and process information more wisely;
- I will be more brave in trying out new things;
- I will have a stronger and more resilient mind;
- I will learn to use math and statistics better;
- I will manage the rhythm of work and play better.
In the second part, after the manners of Sacha Chua, I will list
things I want to stop doing:
- I will do fewer tasks that are repetitive or trivial;
- I will refrain from switching platforms/software/tools without a
systematic, well-thought tryout;
- I will not let excuses like "I am not good at remembering
names/faces" or "I am not a talk starter" hold me back in
socializing;
- I will purchase less and make better use of what I already have;
- I will spend less time exercising, but make it more regular;
- I will refrain from reading without comprehending;
- I will not stop looking into questions just because they are murky
or complicated;
- I will not care too much about the result, but appreciate more what
I gained along the way.
Posted in 流水帐
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Tagged new year, wishlist
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Adam Smith mentioned in his the Wealth of Nations that one reason
that the differenciation of labour improved the efficiency is that
labourers need not to travel from their field to the loom (so to
speak) to complete different tasks. He noted, as many productivity
gurus today do, that changing tasks and tools takes time. Therefore, the
best way to improve productivity may be to shorten the time you travel
between different "tools", which also applies to applications in your
computer.
In the light of this statement, the extensibility and
multi-functionality of GNU Emacs make much sense. If you use it to
the full and do most of your computing/writing tasks in it, you can
save considerable time once used in switching between your browser,
your mail client, your terminal, and IM clients. It would be even
better if you have a large or multiple screens, so you can have all
the information on your fingertip without losing focus.
Posted in Happy Hacking
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Tagged emacs, tool
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Climate Progress 报道，一批国家被哥本哈根气候会议上的活动家们评为“Fossil Food of the Day”：
The second-place award went to the Umbrella Group of industrialized non-EU nations, namely Canada, Iceland, Japan, Kazakhstan, New Zealand, Norway, Russian Federation, Ukraine, United States and Australia. At today’s Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) plenary, the Umbrella Group proposed that carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects should qualify for Clean Development Mechanism financing — a program designed to help developing nations transition to a sustainable economy through reduced deforestation, energy efficiency, and renewable energy projects. Qualifying CCS for this international financing would subsidize coal and oil industries doing the capture programs in developing countries.
Posted in Work Log
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Tagged climate change
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美国 EPA 将认定温室气体危害环境和人类健康，由此为通过立法控制温室气体铺平道路。Green Inc. 报道：
Thomas J. Donohue, the president of the Chamber of Commerce, said that the endangerment finding “could result in a top-down command-and-control regime that will choke off growth by adding new mandates to virtually every major construction and renovation project.” He said that his group supports “rational” federal legislation and an international agreement to control global carbon emissions.
“The devil will be in the details, and we look forward to working with the government to ensure we don’t stifle our economic recovery,” Mr. Donohue said.
不太清楚如果要把二氧化碳排放限制写入法律的话，怎样处理二氧化碳排放允许量不能立即降低，而需要逐年减少的这种情况。可能法案会提出一个减排的分步骤要求，但可以想见相关各行业都会对这个要求的额度提出自己的意见，最终形成的法令可能只有对底限的约束效力，这是命令－控制型管理相对于市场机制不够灵活的地方，但一个强制标准的存在至少可以有助于整个社会的减排意识的形成。
Andrew Sullivan 在他的 blog 里写道：
Scientists are as prone as anyone to taking part in "informational cascades," particularly when they are being funded by granting agencies that reward those who continue in an established line of inquiry (can you imagine funding going to a scientist who found a climate counter-trend?) and when they are trying to publish in peer-reviewed journals whose editorial staff refuse to consider papers that do not come up with the expected results.
费曼关于密利根油滴实验还说过这么一段话：
"It's interesting to look at the history of measurements of the charge of the electron, after Millikan. If you plot them as a function of time, you find that one is a little bigger than Millikan's, and the next one's a little bit bigger than that, and the next one's a little bit bigger than that, until finally they settle down to a number which is higher. Why didn't they discover that the new number was higher right away? It's a thing scientists are ashamed of--this history--because it's apparent that people did things like this: When they got a number that was too high above Millikan's they thought something must be wrong--and they would look for and find a reason why something might be wrong. When they got a number closer to Millikan's value they didn't look so hard. And so they eliminated the numbers that were too far off, and did other things like that."
也许这就是为什么有专门的期刊发表那些看起来错误的结论和失败的实验结果也很重要。至于原始数据的采集和处理，则更应该避免朝已知结论上靠的倾向。
最近爆出了英国 University of East Anglia 部分研究人员在发表关于气候变化的文章时选择性地使用数据的新闻，可以想见 Fox News 之类媒体要怎么利用它大做文章。但 Grist 写道：
Whatever may be on trial in this latest dismal theater piece, it isn’t the validity of the basic conclusions of climate science. Media coverage of this spectacle is a failure if readers do not come away understanding two facts:
The overwhelming majority of peer-reviewed science shows that climate change is happening, human-caused, and dangerous.
The overwhelming majority of economic modeling shows that action to address climate change is compatible with robust economic growth.
事实上，能在哥本哈根会议的节骨眼上揭露这个学术不端问题，正能说明什么才是科学的态度。这条消息能推翻 UEA 和其他机构在这些数据基础上的结论，但也能说明否定论者们对科学界在这个问题上的共识的许多指控是站不住脚的。
朝日新闻报道：
一方、中国政府は２６日、国内総生産（ＧＤＰ）当たりの二酸化炭素（ＣＯ２）排出量を２０年までに０５年比で４０〜４５％削減するとの目標を公表。温莫道不消魂家半夜凉初透宝（ウェン・チアパオ）首相がＣＯＰ１５に出席することも発表した。中国がＣＯ２削減の数値目標を示したのは初めて。
假设在15年中中国维持平均8%的 GDP 增长，2020年的 GDP 将是2005年的近三倍，即使单位排放减少45%，2020年的排放量也还比2005年多60%多。
Posted in Work Log
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Tagged carbon
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Grist reports:
How much impact would a price on carbon have? It depends on how easily people can adjust their behavior in response to price signals (what economists call “elasticity of demand”). If people can easily reduce their energy use or switch to low-carbon energy, you don’t need a very big price on carbon. If they can’t, you have to jack up the price until there’s real pain.
Evidence indicates that the elasticity of energy demand is weirdly low. The price signals that already exist aren’t getting a rational response. People can already save lots of money by investing in efficiency, but they aren’t doing it. They absorb a lot of price pain before they adjust their behavior. They’re leaving profitable investments unexploited on a systemic scale, if you believe research like McKinsey‘s. Why? Credit goes to the inhibiting presence of a variety of market and behavioral failures. Because of these failures, even with a jacked-up energy price, even with stimulus money dumped on the market, progress on efficiency will be slower than it should and could be.
人们有时候愿意为自己习惯的生活方式付出很大代价。在节能减排的问题上，这一行为导致经济杠杆一时也无法改变一般人高能耗的生活习惯。除了二氧化碳排放的定价要不要提高的问题，这个现象提出的更大的问题是：如何降低能源的需求刚性。美国人惯用的市场经济思维方式在这里遇到了问题，那么习惯于大政府的我们能提出新的解决方案么？阻碍人们节能的障碍在于人们认为节能的生活比较麻烦，直接的经济手段不起作用，那么政府能否引入一种新的“麻烦”作为不节能的成本（比如高峰期限制非关键部门供电），促使对能源的需求降低呢？这在能源部门市场化的欧美是行不通的，但在中国好像倒有些可行性。
