Holidays

Rosh Hashanah gave me the opportunity to think about the holidays.

My upbringing was secular. I was baptized in the Catholic Church, and very much admire Pope Francis, but I am not a practicing Catholic. I married into a Jewish family, and some of my relatives are Protestant.

I had the opportunity to tell students about my beliefs, here I take the opportunity to do it again.

I believe in reality.

There is an objective subjectivity so to say. That is, the very process of perceiving is real, and frail. We need other sentient beings to corroborate what we perceive, to be sure. This frailty forces us to be skeptic. I believe that Science provides the best antidote to this fundamental problem of perception.

What is True? This is a scientific question, not religious, nor philosophical.

In my book, President Trump is morally wrong because he lies.

This Blog

I have several blogs maintained by Google. Obviously I am betting on the longevity of Page & Brin's company. There is even one for UFOs, for goodness sake!

The idea is simple, the URL has my name on it. There are other people with the same name, but this is the only blog that identifies me, as a singular universal phenomenon.

Apart from the uniqueness of all of us as human beings, I do believe that I stood out, since I was a boy. I couldn't stop talking, that's more of a girl thing, but there you have it. If people let me talk I don't know when to stop. That explains the number of blogs in Page & Brin, or should I say, Larry & Sergei?

This note was prompted by a dear cousin.

She just woke me up last night with a video from Huitzuco. The town where we used to meet since we can remember. Some of the cousins lived in other places then. She used to live in the town though, and I used to live in Mexico City.

These memories bring back thoughts of another Huitzuco relative, aunt Irma. She grew up with my mother in that town, then later in life she took care of me when I went to study at the University of California.

Yesterday I talked to another cousin in Huitzuco. There was an earthquake there, you can read about it here. 

Fortunately only things were damaged, but my family is under some stress nonetheless.

Physical events can take us away from the fake world invented by a bunch of deluded kids online.

I am glad I touched base with my roots.

The Church of Humberto Cantoral

My father was a free thinker.

Yesterday we lost another one, Dick Gregory.

Both of them knew that their children must have their own thoughts. Think about it, Mr. Gregory used to say during his speeches-sermons. My father taught us to watch TV always thinking of what was going to happen. I even developed the habit of reading books from the end to the beginning.

When I read a scientific article, my first thought is: What's the point?

Obviously neither my father, nor Mr. Gregory, nor myself, know what is coming, there are not prophets with a 100% success rate. That's precisely the nature of this Universe we appeared in. We are always surprised.

Therefore Mr. Gregory was known for his penchant for Conspiracy Theories. My father and him didn't receive a Scientific Education, like I did. In Science we have the Fallibilism Principle. Statements which cannot be proven wrong, are useless to advance our knowledge.

Tomorrow the Moon will cover the Sun around noon, here in Warrenville. This is a scientific statement. All I have to do is to walk out to the backyard and witness one of the marvels our Universe can give us.

Since I am his son, hereby I start a new religion, "The Church of Humberto Cantoral".

Do not believe everything the powers that be tell you, they do it to control you.

Thanks Mr. Gregory, thanks Dad.

César Augusto Cajas Cantoral

My uncle was born on May 5, 1917. A hundred years ago.

Olivia, Martha, and Paula

León Olivé Morett

Mi amigo acaba de morir.

León Olivé Morett

Leccion:

Lo recuerdo con su pelo rubio y su cara enrojecida por el esfuerzo del juego en nuestros descansos, en la Escuela Secundaria Anexa a la Escuela Normal Superior, allá por 1963-65 en la Ciudad de México.

Siempre lo admiré mucho.

Now what?

I see the stock market in the US moving up, but hesitatingly. Sure, this is just a daily poll on people whose business is to know the future. I don't have much skin in the game, so my opinion is not that well informed. Be that as it may. This is what I see.

My personal situation has to be factor in, so you can draw your own conclusion.

I am a Mexican American thinker, born in Mexico City, who has worked in academia most of his life, my first paying job teaching, was when I was around twenty years of age, I am sixty seven years old now, and retired. I've  worked in the private sector as well, both in two big corporations, and in a startup.

Part of my job, in one of the big corporations, was to study the market. I saw first hand, how the second corporation, treated the market, even though, nobody expected my opinion to change their business decisions.

Obviously I had my opinions, whether or not they asked me.

Like Noam Chomsky, I have followed the news since I can remember, unlike him though, I do not know as much as he does. I do read non-fiction books, apart from the news, outside of my area of comfort, which is Theoretical Physics.

Apart from the market per se, I am a scientist, and try to use the scientific method, at least to the extent that sums have to add up, and logic has to be used.

Since the US elected a new president, I have seen a change in the economic activity where I reside, in the plains of Illinois.

I have another blog, Relevant Science, but this blog is more personal, and I am more vested in what I post here. I am a liberal, like professor Paul Krugman from CUNY.

Recently I read a poet whose son was killed at a young age, after an altercation in a bar, saying that the people who killed his son, knew few words. This is an important observation; the less words you know, the more you act differently from those who know many more words than you do. Now with Twitter, you only have to use 140 characters, which you can reuse, as many times as you want.

Now what?

I predict a bubble.

Bubbles are innate to the market economy, thus I expect the historical levels reached by the DJIA, in the US recently, to be sustainable only for four or eight years. The main reason being, that the elected president, does not have a plan which adds up.

I believe this, because there is no blueprint of this candidate's economic program.

If you do have some skin in the game, maybe this is the time for due diligence, and invest somewhere else. If I knew where, I'd be investing myself.

Maybe countries with the fastest rates of growth. Some names come to mind, China, India, and maybe Brazil, if OPEC actually uses the power of oil market monopoly. The elected president of the US is not a friend of Muslim countries yet. Unless and until he lowers the volume in Twitter, do not expect Saudia Arabia, and Iran to come to the table.

If you want to bet for fracking in the US, go talk to the Dakota Nation Leaders that stopped the DAP project.