"RAND - Uniformly distributed pseudo-random numbers." ¡Pues tengo razones de peso para dudarlo!

MATLAB es un programa que permite hacer cálculos matemáticos y simulaciones de alto nivel. Es tan chingón que medio mundo lo usa, desde estudiantes de preparatoria hasta investigadores de ingeniería nuclear.
Este programita tiene una función llamada 'rand' (y otras relacionadas a ésta) que básicamente entrega valores aleatorios en distintas presentaciones. Bueno pues por ahí me contó un pajarito (sin albúr) que los meros meros de MATLAB tienen un algoritmo con el que se puede predecir los resultados que entrega el susodicho comando. Es decir, realmente no son valores totalmente aleatorios dado que existe una forma de conocerlos de antemano.
Los laboratorios clandestinos de MATLAB reciben reportes via internet de todas las veces que el comando 'rand' (y sus variaciones) es utilizado. Después de varios filtros, únicamente archivan aquellos códigos que puedan tener algún tipo de valor científico. Son millones de códigos almacenados en bases de datos monstruosas.
¿Y todo esto para qué? MATLAB se ha convertido en herramienta básica para los círculos de investigación y desarrollo en todo el mundo. Se confía ciegamente en el desempeño del programa. ¿Quién va a dudar del correcto funcionamiento de un comando tan sencillo como ese?
La predicción del futuro ha sido uno de los poderes más codiciados por el hombre a través de la historia y jamás alcanzado en su plenitud. Cuando lo consideren oportuno, los malhechores de los laboratorios clandestinos de MATLAB utilizarán su algoritmo para predecir los resultados de algún sistema mega híper súper dúper sofisticado (desarrollado por personas muy muy muy inteligentes en los antros más recónditos de alguna universidad perdida en sepa-dios-donde), y así poder ¡¡¡CONQUISTAR AL MUNDOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

Por eso digo que hay que tener cuidado porque hay gente muy muy loca por ahí rondando.

What does it take for OLIGARCHIES to realize that technology-induced climate change is jeopardizing our very lives?

George Orwell described a society in which people were oppressed by an exterior agent that would decide over their lives and their thinking. Aldous Huxley and Ray Bradbury described a society were rulers achieve an auto censorship from the society itself, making people love their distorted assimilation of reality. The three authors coincided with each other on two main factors: the existence of an oligarchy (some few individuals with absolute power over the community), and the use of manipulation as a cardinal weapon for submission. We may not be living in a world with a Big Brother, soma, or firemen burning books, but we are for sure living in a world ruled by oligarchs who use manipulation to achieve their interests.

The main issue is not to make ‘people’ aware of the threats of global warming. People know already about this. Of course it is important to be reminding people about the topic and spreading information every day, but the example of people’s activism in Copenhagen last year is a proof of a certain level of awareness. The real question is: what does it takes for the ones who govern this world to react before this issue.

The problem seems easy to solve. If we know that there is an excessive amount of certain gases expelled into the atmosphere that are affecting the Earth’s natural behaviour, we should at least reduce the production of these gases. Doing something similar to what happened when we were alerted about CFCs destroying the ozone layer. Almost every country in the world created laws against the production of CFCs. Now that problem is almost solved. So what is preventing legislators from putting a stop to greenhouse gases? The problem is that the oligarchy ruling this world is not only made up of politicians. The big decisions are made by businessmen, by the leaders of transnational corporations. They were the responsible for the failure of the Kyoto Protocol and will be for what is left of the second attempt to arrive at a deal in Copenhagen.

And the most astonishing thing is that this is something that everybody knows. But while the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, Chanel, Ugly Betty, the Champions League, the pope and money continue being used as manipulation weapons that keep people passive and misinformed, knowledge will not be enough. Proof of that is the fact that hundreds of scientists (Noble Prize winners among them) have warned about the imminent danger of global warming and still there is no reaction.

ExxonMobile and its allies are able to be as cynical as they are because they have the power to suffocate thousands of protesters, hundreds of scientists, millions of e-mails and billions of discussions. They are winning, and reading an article such as the one written by the scientist Sylvia A. Earle about global warming risks [1], where at the end she can be so naïve (tripping into stupidity) to write that the problem can be solved with a two-by-four and a mirror, really dampens the spirit even more.

Let us hope that all the little chisels together may one day make this oligarchy crumble. We can’t hope for them to care about ‘our very lives’.

[1] Silvia A. Earle, What does it take for people to realize that technology-induced climate change is jeopardizing our very lives?, 2000