academic papers regarding zombies...

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Valuethinker
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academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by Valuethinker »

http://www.csun.edu/~dgw61315/econundea ... tracts.htm

A call for academic papers regarding the economics of all aspects of zombies including post zombie apocalypse etc...

Wonder if we could do one on stock indexing in the zombie economy?
ossipago
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by ossipago »

If they weren't so deadly serious, I would have thought this a joke.

It's not totally far-fetched - see this published paper mathematically analyzing zombie infection epidemiology: http://mysite.science.uottawa.ca/rsmith43/Zombies.pdf
NYBoglehead
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by NYBoglehead »

^If someone were to write a college thesis about this, they'd get an F. When a professor writes about, its academic research. Quite ridiculous.
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wjo
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by wjo »

It is clearly meant to be something fun, not a serious scholarly effort. Economists letting off a little steam.

They are just doing it as a publication by a book publisher who hopes the topic may attract a little coin. This is not scholarly work for serious academic journals like Econometrica or such.
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Kenkat
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by Kenkat »

One can really never be TOO prepared for a zombie apocalypse. Even a relatively minor infestation is not to be taken lightly. I am thankful that this type of analysis is being done NOW, while there is still time.

p.s. The DVR will be recording "The Walking Dead" tonight...
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Raymond
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by Raymond »

"I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure."

As I understand it, the mathematics are pretty much that of the spread of an epidemic disease, except for the fact that people killed by the disease reanimate to infect normal humans. Therefore (per Munz et al.) there can never be a stable equilibrium where the undead and the normals can coexist - if not controlled rapidly, the infection will progress to the point where everyone is a zombie or dead, and civilization collapses.

Hence the nuking recommendation :twisted:
"Ritter, Tod und Teufel"
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Valuethinker
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by Valuethinker »

NYBoglehead wrote:^If someone were to write a college thesis about this, they'd get an F. When a professor writes about, its academic research. Quite ridiculous.
Ahh no.

That's not an argument against something, that conventional scholarship would bin an undergraduate thesis on something. Some very big discoveries have been made by questioning what everyone 'knew' to be true. Remember our primary understanding of Ice Ages was formed by a cranky Serbo-Croatian engineer who published in his own language (!) and spent his time in the Belgrade Library thinking about the Earth's orbit (Milunkovich). AFAIK he had no academic teaching post.

On Zombies, the modelling of individuals as independent agents is an interesting area of economics (see anything by the Santa Fe institute). Crowd behaviour etc. Agent modelling is a really good way to understand the sometimes surprising results of mass behaviour-- like financial bubbles.

In the case of Zombies the underlying thinking will help us understand epidemiology and the interaction between economics and epidemiology. Which as the front page of the newspaper today is about the fact that we have an increasing number of bacterium for which NO antiobiotic is effective (no new class of antibiotics has been launched since 1987), is not just an academic exercise.

Read about the flu of 1919. Pittsburg closed public facilities like swimming pools and cinemas early-- St. Louis did not (or vice versa). Big difference on the incidence of the Flu, which killed more people than WW1. (over 40 million is at least one estimate-- in many countries the dead were never counted).

And of course 'bugs' can be social viruses, as well as biological-- Harlem Shake anyone? Gungdam (sp?) dancing? Spread by the internets at the speed of broadband. Or the ever present threat of the next super worm-- like the one that infects millions of Windows XP computers already.

Besides which the Zombie Apocalypse has to be one of the most serious issues for National Security in the 21st century. Don't ignore that.
Last edited by Valuethinker on Mon Mar 11, 2013 4:36 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Valuethinker
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by Valuethinker »

kenschmidt wrote:One can really never be TOO prepared for a zombie apocalypse. Even a relatively minor infestation is not to be taken lightly. I am thankful that this type of analysis is being done NOW, while there is still time.

p.s. The DVR will be recording "The Walking Dead" tonight...
Also historic literature.

John Wyndham's 'Day of the Triffids' about giant mobile plants that blind and eat their victims, is a gripping novelization of the threat that faced England and the world in the early Atomic Age.

His novel of extraterrestrial invasion 'The Kraken Wakes' is still a key case study in War College studies of what to do if aliens invade our oceans and start melting our ice packs to drown us.

And 'The Midwich Cuckoos' is a powerful study of what happens when aliens infiltrate us via our children.

Those concerned with national security should also consider any of the Quatermass TV series in the 1950s and 1960s-- fighting alien horrors. Professor Bernard Quatermass is clearly a composite character based on various heads of science for national security during that time.

Rod Serling, with his military service, clearly had some pretty good insights into the security challenges of the US when he made episodes of The Twilight Zone.

Remember the one when William Shatner sees the daemon trying to rip the engine off the plane? Everyone thinks he's mad? Tell me that wasn't based on real case files!
likegarden
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by likegarden »

To avoid another posting like this and any more movies about that, Congress should create a law that only permits cremation from now on.
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Valuethinker
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by Valuethinker »

Bernd wrote:To avoid another posting like this and any more movies about that, Congress should create a law that only permits cremation from now on.
Poul Anderson Operation Chaos (anticipates Jim Butcher and Harry Dresden by 4 decades, and based on a story by Robert Heinlein 'Waldo and Magic, Inc'). A modern USA but where magic works, and a werewolf and a red headed witch team up to solve mysteries:

'St. John's Wort from graveyards is a materiel of war. You may not know it, but cremation as a practice didn't just die out. It's actually illegal. Thus does the modern age erode our liberties.'

http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/a/pou ... -chaos.htm
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Valuethinker
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by Valuethinker »

A relevant question to those here is whether Zombies have the same investment portfolios as the living? Should they tilt towards perpetual bonds for example?

And should we also consider sector tilting given the risks of a Zombie Apocalypse? Pharmaceuticals? Arms manufacturers? Cleaning companies?
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Valuethinker
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by Valuethinker »

Raymond wrote:"I say we take off and nuke the entire site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure."

As I understand it, the mathematics are pretty much that of the spread of an epidemic disease, except for the fact that people killed by the disease reanimate to infect normal humans. Therefore (per Munz et al.) there can never be a stable equilibrium where the undead and the normals can coexist - if not controlled rapidly, the infection will progress to the point where everyone is a zombie or dead, and civilization collapses.

Hence the nuking recommendation :twisted:

'We had to destroy the village in order to save it' :happy :wink:
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Phineas J. Whoopee
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by Phineas J. Whoopee »

Valuethinker wrote:A relevant question to those here is whether Zombies have the same investment portfolios as the living? Should they tilt towards perpetual bonds for example?

And should we also consider sector tilting given the risks of a Zombie Apocalypse? Pharmaceuticals? Arms manufacturers? Cleaning companies?
Brains!

I reason as long as I'm the low-cost, high-quality supplier with excellent customer service, the zombies won't eat my personal one.

PJW
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Re: academic papers regarding zombies...

Post by LadyGeek »

You guys are slipping. I'm disappointed that no one asked if zombies follow the adage: "Buy When There's Blood In The Streets", or, if Blood money counts as fixed income. (Perpetual bonds are a good start, though.)

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