Chicken Little and Black Swan. Disaster Avoidance

[ramana]

Suggest folks read up Anti-Fragile by Nicholas Nasim Taleb.
He wrote two other books: Fooled by Randomness and Black Swan.

You can follow him on Twitter.
instead of looking at what will go wrong. look at your system vulnerabilities and then see how they can be patched.
And re-build the bricks that make up your society and civilization.

[UlanBatori]

Countries planning to evacuate citizens from Wuhan:
A look at steps being taken:
— CHINA: .. cut transportation links to and from the city.. on Jan. 22. Expanded controls to several nearby cities. Anyone traveling from Wuhan is required to register and quarantine themselves for 14 days — the virus' maximum incubation period.
Hong Kong barred entry to travelers from Hubei province and told Hong Kong residents returning from the area to quarantine themselves at home.
— JAPAN: 560 Japanese citizens are confirmed in Hubei and chartered evacuation flights are being prepared to leave “as soon as possible." ..Evacuees are expected to include employees of Honda Motor Co., Tokyo Electron, Aeon Co. and other Japanese companies operating in Wuhan. Cabinet will designate the new coronavirus as an infectious disease subject to forced hospitalization and isolation. Such preventative measures appear to be preparation for the evacuation.
— UNITED STATES: Consulate in Wuhan plans a charter flight Tuesday to evacuate its personnel and some other Americans. limited capacity on the flight to San Francisco meant priority will be given to to individuals “at greater risk from coronavirus.”
— FRANCE: Health Minister Agnes Buzyn said French citizens who want to leave Wuhan will be taken on a direct flight to France in the middle of the week, and then held in quarantine for 14 days. French automaker PSA, which produces Peugeot and Citroen cars, said it was evacuating its expatriate employees and their families from Wuhan and quarantining them in another city. It didn't elaborate.
— SRI LANKA: Embassy in Beijing has applied for a Sri Lankan Airlines plane to be allowed to land at Wuhan airport to airlift home 32 Sri Lankan students and their family members. .. working to bring back all other Sri Lankan students throughout China. About 860 Sri Lankan students are in China.
— AUSTRALIA: “exploring all opportunities” to help with evacuation of a number of Australians reportedly in Wuhan. doesn't have a consular presence in Wuhan.
— GERMANY: government crisis response committee meeting soon with medical experts to evaluate the situation. He said the number of German citizens in Wuhan is in the double digits. currently advises Germans to refrain from or postpone "non-essential travel" to China.
— THAILAND: Prime Minister said Defense Ministry was ready to evacuate its citizens from affected areas in China, but hadn't yet received permission from the Chinese government. 64 Thais in Wuhan, and 18 others elsewhere in Hubei province.

[UlanBatori]

Mag 7.7 earthquake in Carribbean!!! Pretty close - that could have hit a major metropolis like Miami.
I guess Carribbean does get quakes: Haiti had a big one in 2010, and Martinique got wiped out by a huge volcanic explosion long ago.

[chanakyaa]

Another area often overlooked...

Undersea Submarine Cable Map

Submarine Communications Cable

[UlanBatori]

Coronavirus map. It is spreading very fast, people. 6000 to 7783 in 1.5 hours.

170 confirmed deaths so far.

[Vikas]

A virus may not be a BS event but how we handle it may make it one.
If push comes to Shove, Can democracies quarantine whole towns like China has done.
If one of the virus eventually spreads across the globe, Do we have the b@lls and resources ?
Why because epidemic like coronoavirus would be hard to contain if movement of potential infected bodies is not restricted within a zone.

[UlanBatori]

8235. They show one in north India and one in north-central India, but there is at least one more: a young bibi (Comrade?) Wohan-returned and now in central Mallostan - guvrmand hospital isolation ward.. Hopefully she has just a cold and is under watch. 600 more desis, slated to be returned to desh.

[Vikas]

Just humor me with this BS scenario..

We are in the second half of 2020.
Asia in the grip of unmanageable Coronavirus with most of countries locking down towns and cities.
Severe Economic downturn hitting economies hard and Oil prices having crossed USD100 per barrel
Unpredictable weather patterns causing food inflation to go up (Remember Onions till few days back)

A neighboring country uses its ever so famous 'Tactical brilliance' and tries to snatch part of disputed territory with armed groups and state actors to protect Minorities all the while being backed up by the country from where the virus originated (Helps take focus away to a war between 2 nooclear armed neighbors).

[chola]

A virus may not be a BS event but how we handle it may make it one.
If push comes to Shove, Can democracies quarantine whole towns like China has done.
If one of the virus eventually spreads across the globe, Do we have the b@lls and resources ?
Why because epidemic like coronoavirus would be hard to contain if movement of potential infected bodies is not restricted within a zone.

No, which is why I'm glad it happen in Cheen. Imagine this happening in Pakiland or Bangladesh (yes they are democracies) and we would have thousands of cases in India already.

This is nice because it is wrecking the chini economy and is nicely contained in China (mostly.) I'm not blood-thirsty because this thing kills far less than the flu. There are 8500 deaths in the US from the flu during the roughly the same time period as the corona virus which killed 250. Wall Street bounced back when the analysts cranked the numbers of its affect on the US.

[UlanBatori]

I saw somewhere (WhatsApp) that PRC had admitted that the CV came out of a P4 lab, whatever that is. No mention seen even on Arrteedotcom.
But the virus has been isolated and a cure devised by HongKonis, per other reports, and a 15-minute test has been developed by cheen, which will massively shrink the number of "suspected cases" now in quarantine or isolation wards. Todin, Moody's downgrading of Boeing stock is likely to be more of the downer than the CV.
For the scenario posted by Vikas, flaw is that such a war will do nothing inside cheen to distract anyone. The ones quarantined have nothing to do except watch TV (no cellphones/WhatsApp, safe guess) but cheen will probably not be broadcasting war news either.
And stock market will shoot up because Peace Will Have a Chance as the One Nation gets broken into 5. If they actually launch mijiles, desis will have more to worry about than stock market.
*********************************************************************************

Bigger threat today is that Turkey has threatened to attack Syria if "attacks don't stop" on "Turkish Territory". Turns out the TT in question is several "observation posts" set up AROUND IDLIB (i.e., well inside Syria) to coordinate terrorist operations. Arrogance at its highest. Interesting Russian response, lets see..
In Libya, Russia and Turkey are on opposite sides. Reminds me of the Stalin Bright Idea of dividing Poland between him and Hitler. Libyan oil and gas are the big plum to Erdogan, and I think he is sadly mistaken there.

Turkey is puffed-up because Russia aligned with them against NATO/US, **AND** the Russia-Oirope pipeline goes through Turkey. But Oiropean history is clear on this: where money is involved, they will sneak in to strike a deal with Russia for northern pipelines. EU really cannot afford to at anything that reduces their costs: they are heading for bankruptcy against cheen competition.

Then no one needs Turkey, so Turkey will have to protect pipeline security just to have any chance for oil revenue. Which means Putin can crush Turkey. And NATO will not come to the rescue.

Along with Chinese aid to Greece to induce a Greek exit from EU as well. Suppose Russia guarantees Greece's security from Turkish attack - how attached is Greece to Oirope, remembering that Germany has them by the Hearts and Minds? Also remembering German kindness in WW2? With Chinese financial guarantees and Russian military protection, Greece could to EU.

UBCN's famed far-out CT Department asks about the possibility of Russia wrenching Italy out of the grip of Oirope. How respected are the dark-haired Eyetalians in EU? AFAIK there is no serious historical khulji between Rome and Moscow. A friendly Italy will suddenly open a Balkans route to the Mediterranean for Putinji. Turkey's monopoly on that, collapses. Nations such as Bosnia and whats-their names with coastlines will not dare biss on Putin at that stage.

Sooner or later all these will lead to a collapse of Turkey - and I think that will be sudden. Note that Putin becomes lame-duckski around mid-2023, so there is an urgency to all this. What comes afterwards in Turkey will probably not be EU-friendly. That would be a near-BS collapsing crater smack in the intersection of Oirope, Asia, North Africa and the ME oil nations.

[Vikas]

^^ Why do you think Turkey can collapse ? Are there any signs ?
Just like Moscow is playing its game in Lavant, Turkey too is looking at Turkey extension like Noida extension in surrpunding areas.
With Russia, Rest of Europe never had great friendly relations in recent past from the days of Czar, so I doubt if anyone is rushing into Russians arms anytime soon.
Cheen is a complex entity to crack. Half the economists of the world think that China is going to implode in like yesterday while other half thinks that China is lying thru its teeth and can never become enough of a Super power to pull half decent countries beyond its pale into its Orbit.

[UlanBatori]

In Turkey's case, Karma. Despite being with the losing side in WW1 they avoided major damage, and their Armenian Genocide was conveniently swept under the sands of Deir ez Zor. They were then slimy enough to stay "neutral" in WW2 , behind the pajamas of Field Marshal Kemal WhatATurk! and thus avoided "reconstruction" in the Halliburton sense. But look at their recent record, enough said. It is only a question of when and how deep a sinkhole. And deep may they crater.

But I came here to post the Big Neuj: From American Association of Individual Investors:

This virus can be considered a black swan event. These are rare events that cause a significant reaction in the markets. Black swans are systematic risks because if you are invested in stocks when they occur, your portfolio is going to take a hit. They are also low-probability events.

UBCN. Ahead of the curve as always. But how far ahead is always open to question: We BOUGHT stock in last 2 dins.
In UBCN's estimation, the CV is {yawn}. A good number of mop-up cases, sure, and hence a lot of news, but I think cheen has contained it at least as far as cheen goes. Their explort of cv-nilodhini will make up for any lost exports due to quarantine.

What I see here is a disaster evaded, by prompt and RESPONSIBLE action by a mature superpower. Yeah I saw the October thing, but flu is a common thing as weather turns cold and dry. Here the diagnosis, warnings, quarantine procedures, research to track and isolate, early publication of results, and now a "cure" have all come out in a matter of DAYS!! The WHO and US CDC are left in the dust by this performance.
Images of the PM of cheen with mask, conversing (how does one do that I wonder) with two terrified party members, is nevertheless compelling.

I think stock of cheen should go way up. This is the real transition from "miscellaneous goods supplier to the West" to "SupelPowel #1"

[UlanBatori]

Speaking of chickens... Bird Fly strikes in cheen again.

[UlanBatori]

I know "natural" BS was declared verboten, but then nCOV is "natural", hain?
What if the next one does not "swing by" but is seen to be "immobile" in radar images except for a blue-shift?

[sooraj]

Scientists Say There Might Be A Supernova On February 21, Warn Of ‘Darker’ Sky For Months

[Pratyush]

If the star goes Nova. The event would have happened 642 years ago.

I was wondering if it could be an ELE. But apparently it's too small to be a Gama Ray burst event.

https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sc ... ut-to-blow

[UlanBatori]

^^ Already happened 641 years and 51 weeks ago, but we are going to get "energized" only next week. Or the next.. or 100 years from now. I wonder when Proxima Centauri is scheduled. THAT would probably wipe us out with gamma etc. If predictable with accuracy, one could build enough shelters 6 feet deep to escape, coming out only for 12 hours a day. Unless gamma radiation or secondary glowing particles generated by cosmic rays hang around in the atmosphere. So doesn't quite qualify as a BS. Brisk trade in shelter-digging, no doubt. Where the initial shock waves hits ... but that will be thousands of years later, so no worries. I think the Medium Asteroid is still the biggest threat for a global wipeout .... that is theoretically escapable by sheer luck.

[disha]

Black Swan event I think is going to be deflation and negative interest rates.

Germany is already going the way of Japan. The rest of Europe is not far behind. Then comes the US & Cheen. That is 2/3rd of the world economy. What does that mean for India, a lot of investments heading towards India?

Are Indian institutions capable of taking in the deluge of investments coming into India in the next decade? For example, the HSR from Mumbai-Ahemdabad. Several political classes are still in the 18th century when India wants to come to the 21st century.