06 November 2024

A Dimension Called " DEPTH OF COMPETITION" | Phys.org

 NOVEMBER 6, 2024

'Shallow' sports and 'deep' social hierarchies: Not all pecking orders are created equal
New research from the University of Michigan has introduced a metric that can quantify the depth of all sorts of competitions, including sports and video games, but also more social "contests," including university rankings and animal hierarchies, or pecking orders. Credit: Kraig Sims/University of Michigan


University of Michigan researchers have added a new dimension to the mathematics used to predict the outcomes of all manner of competitions, including sports, games and social hierarchies in both humans and animals.
The research is published in the journal Science Advances.

This dimension, which they call "depth of competition," can be integrated into a variety of important and lucrative fields. It could, for instance, help project winners of match-ups in sports, forecast consumer preferences, rank universities and evaluate hiring practices.
  • But it also provides a single framework to compare and glean insights from a wide spectrum of competitive interactions. As long as the researchers have data, be it from board games or baboon fights, their model can calculate the depth of any competition with a winner and loser.
"The model doesn't know if it's getting a sports data set or an animal data set," said Max Jerdee, a doctoral student in physics at U-M and an author of the new study. "What we're trying to do is build a general way of measuring inequality in a bunch of these different settings."
In this framework, the more unequal a competition, the deeper it is. In deeper competitions, then, the competitors are more stratified by their skill and status. So it might be surprising to learn that, in this context, human games and sports end up at the shallow end of the spectrum.
But this is by design, said Mark Newman, U-M professor of physics and complex systems.
"A game like basketball, for example, is not actually a shallow sport," Newman said. "There's a huge range of abilities and you can play at many different levels. But people don't because there wouldn't be any point having the average high-schooler going against an NBA professional."
Even within the NBA, worse teams have better odds to draft better young players onto their teams as a pathway to improvement, Jerdee pointed out.
"Saying something is shallow may have a negative connotation, but you could also say it's more competitive, less predictable or more exciting," Jerdee said. "They're all describing the same thing."

While humans have norms and structures to promote parity and exciting competitions, other animals do not.

Consider chickens, the animal responsible for the expression "pecking order." Within a flock, there is a clear hierarchy where stronger birds peck those lower in the order with very little risk of "losing" the competition or being bested in a display of dominance.
So, using Jerdee and Newman's assessment, basketball has a depth of less than one layer while chickens' hierarchy is closer to 20 layers. 
  • The social hierarchy of hyenas is even more rigid and predictable, with a depth of more than 100 layers.
Competitive interactions in human society, including university rankings and social hierarchies within high school friend groups, land between sports and animal competitions in terms of depth.
Beyond assessing the depth of a competition, the new model can also predict the "winner" of certain competitions. The method could thus be used to assess university rankings, to project consumer preference, or to predict the outcome of sporting events, even between competitors who have never met before.

To demonstrate this predictive capability, the team showed that the 2022 U-M football team would have had an 89% chance of beating the University of Wisconsin had they played one another.

More information: Maximilian Jerdee et al, Luck, skill, and depth of competition in games and social hierarchies, Science Advances (2024). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adn2654. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adn2654

Journal information: Science Advances

Provided by University of Michigan


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Stranger Things 5 | Title Tease | Netflix

Adel Al-Saleh, SES

IT'S A WWF WORLD!!! --------------- Trump Wins The White House. Again.

Great news, Mel Brooks fans! There’s a Spaceballs sequel coming down the pike, and the script is supposed to be amazing!

Great news, Mel Brooks fans! 
There’s a Spaceballs sequel coming down the pike, and the script is supposed to be amazing
Everyone Loves ‘Spaceballs 2’ Script, Says Guy Writing ‘Spaceballs 2’ 

Anonymous readers have been ‘blown away’ 


November 05, 2024
Great news, Mel Brooks fans! There’s a Spaceballs sequel coming down the pike, and the script is supposed to be amazing
How do we know? Screenwriter and potential star Josh Gad tells us so. He just finished his first draft, and “everybody who’s read it has been blown away,” says the guy who just finished the first draft
. “The process of working on this with and alongside Mel Brooks has been one of the highlights of my career.” 







Gad then proceeded to tell Forbes everything about the new script without actually saying anything at all
  • “It was sort of a fever dream that this all happened,” he explained. 
  • “Mel has been so unbelievably supportive, involved and electrified by this because it’s the one that surprisingly got away. 
  • It’s a dream to be able to finally make the reality prophesied by Yogurt in the first movie happen. 
  • I can’t say more than that. I can’t tell you anything beyond (the) process at this point, but I can tell you every hour of every day right now is spent making this project closer and closer to reality — and I think we’re nearing the end zone here.” 
What do we actually know? 
Gad has a deal with Amazon MGM Studios to make a sequel to Mel Brooks’ eighth-best comedy (according to Rotten Tomatoes), although no cast or potential release date has been announced. But unfortunately for Gad, the comments section over at Deadline seems to be populated by people who haven’t read his remarkable first draft. 
Here’s a sample of the mean-spirited reaction to the “blown away” news:
  • “Mel, cash the check quickly.”
  • “Josh Gad is only funny to Josh Gad.”
  • “A remake of a decades old parody based on a thoroughly bastardized movie that is also decades old. Just what the world needs.”
  • “Leave it alone already and just create something new. A sequel to this will only shit on the original.”
  • “Screw a sequel. I’m going to go watch the original now.”
  • “Did we just hit the bottom of the barrel?”
  • “Josh Gad is truly the absolute worst.”
Yikes. 
The irony is, we could have had a Spaceballs sequel years ago, made by someone to whom fans and even Deadline readers would have given the benefit of the doub
t. Rick Moranis definitely had a funny title in mind when he pitched his concept to Brooks: Spaceballs III: The Search for Spaceballs II. 
Unfortunately, “I was unable to make a deal with Mel. I couldn’t make a deal,” he told Heeb in 2013
“It would have been something I would have wanted to do. But that ship has sailed.”

TRUMP HUMP

 



News Release BEA News: U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services, September 2024

 The deficit increased from $70.8 billion in August (revised) to $84.4 billion in September, as exports decreased and imports increased.

US Department of Commerce Bureau of Economic Analysis

BEA News: U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services, September 2024

The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) has issued the following news release today:

The U.S. monthly international trade deficit increased in September 2024 according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis and the U.S. Census Bureau. 

The deficit increased from $70.8 billion in August (revised) to $84.4 billion in September, as exports decreased and imports increased. 

The goods deficit increased $14.2 billion in September to $109.0 billion. 

The services surplus increased $0.6 billion in September to $24.6 billion.


News Release

EMBARGOED UNTIL RELEASE AT 8:30 a.m. EST,
Tuesday, November 5, 2024
BEA 24–50
CB 24–180



U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services, September 2024

The U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis announced today that the goods and services deficit was $84.4 billion in September, up $13.6 billion from $70.8 billion in August, revised.

U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services Deficit
Deficit:$84.4 Billion +19.2%°
Exports:$267.9 Billion –1.2%°
Imports:$352.3 Billion +3.0%°

Next release: Tuesday, December 5, 2024

(°) Statistical significance is not applicable or not measurable. Data adjusted for seasonality but not price changes

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis; U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services, November 5, 2024

Goods and Services Trade Deficit: Seasonally adjusted









Exports, Imports, and Balance (exhibit 1)

September exports were $267.9 billion, $3.2 billion less than August exports. September imports were $352.3 billion, $10.3 billion more than August imports.

The September increase in the goods and services deficit reflected an increase in the goods deficit of $14.2 billion to $109.0 billion and an increase in the services surplus of $0.6 billion to $24.6 billion.

Year-to-date, the goods and services deficit increased $69.6 billion, or 11.8 percent, from the same period in 2023. Exports increased $84.7 billion or 3.7 percent. Imports increased $154.4 billion or 5.3 percent.


Three-Month Moving Averages (exhibit 2)

The average goods and services deficit increased $3.8 billion to $78.0 billion for the three months ending in September.

  • Average exports increased $0.9 billion to $268.5 billion in September.
  • Average imports increased $4.7 billion to $346.6 billion in September.

Year-over-year, the average goods and services deficit increased $15.9 billion from the three months ending in September 2023.

  • Average exports increased $10.5 billion from September 2023.
  • Average imports increased $26.4 billion from September 2023.


Exports (exhibits 3, 6, and 7)

Exports of goods decreased $3.2 billion to $176.0 billion in September.

  

Exports of goods on a Census basis decreased $3.5 billion.

  • Capital goods decreased $1.9 billion.
    • Civilian aircraft decreased $1.7 billion.
  • Consumer goods decreased $1.4 billion.
    • Pharmaceutical preparations decreased $2.0 billion.
  • Industrial supplies and materials decreased $1.4 billion.
    • Crude oil decreased $1.3 billion.
    • Other petroleum products decreased $0.5 billion.

  Net balance of payments adjustments increased $0.3 billion.

Exports of services decreased less than $0.1 billion to $91.9 billion in September.

  • Maintenance and repair services decreased $0.2 billion.
  • Government goods and services increased $0.1 billion.
  • Transport increased $0.1 billion.


Imports (exhibits 4, 6, and 8)

Imports of goods increased $10.9 billion to $285.0 billion in September.

  Imports of goods on a Census basis increased $11.0 billion.

  • Consumer goods increased $4.0 billion.
    • Pharmaceutical preparations increased $1.9 billion.
  • Capital goods increased $2.8 billion.
    • Computers increased $1.0 billion.
    • Semiconductors increased $0.8 billion.
  • Industrial supplies and materials increased $2.2 billion.
    • Nonmonetary gold increased $0.7 billion.
    • Finished metal shapes increased $0.6 billion.
  • Automotive vehicles, parts, and engines increased $1.2 billion.
    • Passenger cars increased $0.9 billion.

  Net balance of payments adjustments decreased less than $0.1 billion.

Imports of services decreased $0.6 billion to $67.3 billion in September.

  • Charges for the use of intellectual property decreased $0.8 billion.
  • Travel decreased $0.2 billion.
  • Transport increased $0.3 billion.


Real Goods in 2017 Dollars – Census Basis (exhibit 11)

The real goods deficit increased $11.6 billion, or 13.1 percent, to $100.1 billion in September, compared to a 15.3 percent increase in the nominal deficit.

  • Real exports of goods decreased $1.8 billion, or 1.2 percent, to $148.2 billion, compared to a 2.0 percent decrease in nominal exports.
  • Real imports of goods increased $9.8 billion, or 4.1 percent, to $248.3 billion, compared to a 4.0 percent increase in nominal imports.


Revisions

Revisions to August exports

  • Exports of goods were revised down $0.2 billion.
  • Exports of services were revised down $0.4 billion.

Revisions to August imports

  • Imports of goods were revised down $0.2 billion.
  • Imports of services were revised up less than $0.1 billion.

Goods by Selected Countries and Areas: Monthly – Census Basis (exhibit 19)

The September figures show surpluses, in billions of dollars, with South and Central America ($3.5), Netherlands ($3.2), Hong Kong ($2.2), United Kingdom ($1.4), Australia ($1.4), Singapore ($1.3), Brazil ($1.1), and Belgium ($0.3). Deficits were recorded, in billions of dollars, with China ($26.9), European Union ($23.8), Mexico ($16.0), Vietnam ($12.2), Ireland ($9.3), Taiwan ($7.0), Germany ($7.0), Canada ($5.7), South Korea ($5.7), Japan ($5.3), India ($3.4), Italy ($3.4), Switzerland ($2.3), Malaysia ($2.1), France ($1.1), Israel ($0.8), and Saudi Arabia ($0.2).

  • The deficit with the European Union increased $4.7 billion to $23.8 billion in September. Exports decreased $2.1 billion to $30.6 billion and imports increased $2.6 billion to $54.4 billion.
  • The deficit with Vietnam increased $2.5 billion to $12.2 billion in September. Exports increased $0.1 billion to $1.1 billion and imports increased $2.6 billion to $13.3 billion.
  • The surplus with the United Kingdom increased $1.1 billion to $1.4 billion in September. Exports increased $0.6 billion to $7.1 billion and imports decreased $0.5 billion to $5.7 billion.

All statistics referenced are seasonally adjusted; statistics are on a balance of payments basis unless otherwise specified. Additional statistics, including not seasonally adjusted statistics and details for goods on a Census basis, are available in exhibits 1-20b of this release. For information on data sources, definitions, and revision procedures, see the explanatory notes in this release. The full release can be found at www.census.gov/foreign-trade/Press-Release/current_press_release/index.html or www.bea.gov/data/intl-trade-investment/international-trade-goods-and-services. The full schedule is available in the Census Bureau’s Economic Briefing Room at www.census.gov/economic-indicators/ or on BEA’s website at www.bea.gov/news/schedule.

Next release: December 5, 2024, at 8:30 a.m. EST
U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services, October 2024

Notice

Discontinuation of BEA’s “Release Highlights”

With the release of “U.S. International Trade in Goods and Services, November 2024” on January 7, 2025, BEA will discontinue the “Release Highlights” document that has accompanied each news release as part of the release’s “Related Materials.” Information in this document will continue to be available in the release and on BEA’s website.

If you have questions or need additional information, please contact BEA, Balance of Payments Division, at InternationalAccounts@bea.gov.

A Dimension Called " DEPTH OF COMPETITION" | Phys.org

  NOVEMBER 6, 2024 'Shallow' sports and 'deep' social hierarchies: Not all pecking orders are created equally by  University...