I was doing my daily morning reading of [Slashdot] when I ran across this interesting [article].

It deals with two CERN researchers and some very interesting [work] that they've used to investigate the need for "Dark Matter" in the universe.

Dark matter was first used as a sort of variable to explain why many galaxies rotated as though their mass was much heavier than observed. (The [Galaxy Rotation Problem]).
I can still remember my father piffling about "Dark Matter" as a substance that could not be detected or seen, but somehow must exist. Dad never was one for scientific flights of fancy. Well, as it turns out, his skepticism was merited.

Evidently, the scientists who first postulated that there was a problem with galaxy rotation used Newtonian physics to approximate their behavior. Even to me, and my relatively pitiful grasp of astrophysics, this seems a bit suspect. Large masses (like galaxies or even stars) have sufficient mass to bend the fabric of reality enough to cause all sorts of non-Newtonian behavior. To correctly model this more complex behavior, relativistic models must be employed.

I am guilty, as many scientists are, of putting physicists on a sort of pedestal. This seems like a rather glaring problem, whichever way you look at it. I suppose the initial (rather naive) assumption that one may use simple Newtonian treatments on objects as massy as galaxies could be overlooked, but the necessity to invent a whole new form of matter as a way of supporting your theory is just plain wrong.

The story doesn't end there, however.
As a poster on slashdot pointed out, there are several theories surrounding the "big bang" that utilize dark matter, such as the [Lambda-CDM Model] and the recent [Cosmic microwave background radiation] work that's been postulated.

I would like to toot my own horn and state that I was never convinced about dark matter in the first place. For one, it sounded uncomfortably similar to "The Ihms/Sawvel Inconsistent Constant" (ISIC) that Mike and I used to great effect in our undergraduate careers. It's way too easy to insert a variable that magically makes your problems dissappear then actually digging deeper and possibly uncovering the actual explanation.

The "Take Home" lesson from this is that science is a changing field, and that no matter how widely-accepted a theory is, it can be turned on it's ear in an instant. An interesting dynamic of the scientific field is that scientists (by and large) are rather similar to sheep. Once a theory reaches critical mass (i.e. enough scientists are talking about it), it self-sustains and will quite quickly reach general acceptance.
Personally, I think many of the aspects of naturalism to fall under this category. I whole-heartedly believe that one day, scientists will look upon abiogenesis as a quaint theory and in a "oh, that's what they used to think" condescending sort of way. (Just as current scientists look down upon their ancestors describing bacteria as "bags of protoplasmic jelly").

Facinating stuff, to be sure.

In slightly lighter news...

[Bungie] [broke] the big news that the Lord of the Rings director, Peter Jackson, will be the exectutive producer for Halo, the film based upon the game of the same name.
Although I've never been a fan of films based upon computers games (or visa-versa), the Bungie crew have a long history of being perfectionist control freaks about projects related to their products. Legend goes that the sent back several previous mockups of various Halo-related models with the command "More Detail!" until they passed muster with the Bungie team.
I have hopes that with Jackson on board, this film could actually be pretty neat. We will see.

In buisness news,

Delphi Automotive, the company my father works for, [filed] for bankruptcy this saturday.
Although not much of a suprise (esp. for it's employees), the reasons behind it are painfully obvious, and touch upon a [previous entry] concerning unions, as well as plain bad management.

I'll cover the managment issues first.
Now I'm no historian of economics, but I believe that there have been three phases of management techniques seen throughout american history.

First, the ancient.
This is the historical model of one (or a few) people starting a company, and then growing it into a large corporation. This means that individuals in management are (generally) former workers themselves, and at least have a grasp of what is needed at the nitty-gritty level.

Second, the Old.
This model really grew once individuals could obtain an education based solely in "Management", or as I like to think, "Telling people what to do". Now don't get me wrong, having a good leader can ensure that an amazing amount of work gets done efficently. There is always room for a good leader.
However, a leader who has no clue how the various segments of the team work together, or even what they do is more dangerous than not having a leader at all.
It is this "I don't need to know how to do it, but just get it done" mentality that is very problematic. It basically assures that you have idiots running the asylum, as it takes very little intelligence to order people about.
This is what gives rise to the "managerial class" that I complained about earlier. Many managers actually disdain to learn anything about the job of the workers below them, because they see it as something that they're too important to do. (If you ever run into a situation like that, run away as fast as possible.) It's no accident that the best bosses are often those who have the most experience at what you're doing.

Finally, There is the "New" model.
This was formed directly in response to the terrible problems that people were encountering with the ridiculous profusion of managerial layers. The new mantra is "no more than seven levels of managment". The problem is, they don't seem to have gotten rid of any managers, they've just made the operative teams smaller.

Let me explain:

Say we have 10,000 "workers". A worker is someone who's immediate responsiblities do not include overseeing or directing another individual.
Now, under the "Old" model, for every 10 workers, say, we have a first-tier manager. For every 10 first-tier managers, we have 1 second-tier manager, and so on, up to the fifth-level "CEO".
Let's say that we've now decided to reduce the level of tiers to a maximum of three. Well, instead of simply cutting out the management layers, we redistribute them so that instead of 10 workers for every first-tier manager, we now have five.
Therefore, the "new" model is somewhat more efficient that the "old" model, but still suffers from abject ignorance among the managerial ranks. Since they're a bit closer to the actual work being done, one can at least hope that the Sawvel/Ihms theory of intellegence osmosis (SITIO) comes into play.

As I said before, bad management wasn't the sole source of Delphis' downfall. (By-the-way, the rareified top of the managerial corps of Delphi got their golden parachute deals lengthened from 12 months to 18 at the [last moment]).

They were saddled with some completely outrageous UAW obligations, including but not limited to extremly cushy medical coverage (for retirees) and [full-time pay] for 4,000 UAW non-working "workers". (Delphi has approx 36,000 hourly workers total, which means that Delphi is throwing over 10 percent of its paid wages down the toilet)

It seems as though bad management weakened Delphi, and the hourly ranks nailed it in its coffin.

As [Bloomberg] pointed out, the filing for bankruptcy will allow Delphi to cut itself free of it's ridiculous concessions to the unions and might make some breathing room. From talking to Dad, there are several divisions within Delphi (his included) that are still making plenty of money. Exactly how this interesting story of a company plays out is left to be seen.

While I'm talking about buisness failures, the RIAA is at it again. (Don't they ever stop?)
This time they're taking on google's [Google Video] site, [demanding] that they are entitled to revenue from ads on search pages resulting from people typing in strings like "madonna", etc.

As I've talked about [previously], a new digital age is quickly approaching, and antiquated buisness concepts better suited to chickens and flour are passing.

For example, if you've watched a DVD released in the last year or so, you've probably seen the "Pirating is Theft" short movie that the MPAA forces you to watch before you actually get to see the movie you paid for.
If pirating a movie is theft, then why are they bringing copyright violation cases against filesharers? It's blatant deception, and it's the reason they can claim that you owe them $250,000 instead of the $500 or so that you'd normally be up for if it was simply theft.

Anyway you look at it, it is not theft. When you download a song, you are not making it unavailable to others, as you would if you were stealing a CD from somebody else.
And here's the real crux of the matter, Steve Jobs has proven that if you meet the pricepoint of what people are willing to pay for a song, they will buy it by the millions (the iTunes store has almost reached a billion songs sold!).

Most people today are not willing to pay $24.99 for a CD that cost the label about $0.50 to make. Given the technology available today, studio costs are almost negligeable, with many/most indie bands having sound quality equal (or in some cases, even better than!) "professional" studio time.

The RIAA/MPAA are stuck in a rapidly disintegrating buisness model, and the extreme measure they're taking to protect that model are only furthering their problems (as evidenced by their gestapo tactics against their fans and SJ).

Of course, it's easy for one to say that they should change marketing tactics. There is no universal law that says a company is somehow entitled to make as much money as it wants. Simple human nature is always going to drive a desire to pay as little as possible, with free being the best.

So how does a company combat the problem? By appealing to another basic human desire: Reciprocity. People are willing to support a cause if they like it enough. The arts survived for thousands of years based upon the client/patron system. Steve Jobs (SJ) has shown that millions of people are willing to pay 99 cents for a good song, even when it's possible to get that very same song free.
It's not that humans are good at heart, it's because they want to get more of a good thing. They realize that if the band/director doesn't get any money, they won't be able to make any more material, and that's why they're willing to pay a bit.

Of course, $18.99 or $24.99 for ten pop songs isn't going to interest anybody.

The biggest piss-off for me is this concept that the RIAA/MPAA is letting me "rent" or "allows" me to watch content that I've paid for. If I pay twenty bucks for a DVD, I own the information on that DVD. As long as I don't sell it, I should be able to copy it to my DVD, send it to a friend, or whatever. If the friend likes it enough, and wants his the artist to continue to make material like it, he should buy his own copy, of course. However, restricting the initial purchaser from doing what he wants with his property is ridiculous. (Like [reselling] it.)

And don't even get me started on [Kelo V. New London]. That's a whole other can of worms that I'm too already too steamed about to get into.