Corruption World-Wide

Corruption. Everything is measured these days. It has been said if it cannot be measured, it doesn’t exist. So, even corruption has been measured. While there is no real method to measure actual corruption, it is measured indirectly by perceptions of residents. So, we go transparent, that is to the transparency website to examine corruption*.

A total of 176 countries were evaluated. The lower ranked countries have the lowest scores (based on a 0-100 score). They are by plagued by untrustworthy and badly functioning public institutions like the police and judiciary. This includes bribery and extortion. Higher-ranked countries tend to have more freedom of the press, public access to information about public expenditure, higher standards of integrity for officials, and generally independent judicial systems.

Below, we show the bottom or most corrupt countries (Table 1) followed by the top or least corrupt countries (Table 2).

Table 1. Most corrupt countries

Country

CPI2016 Score

Rank

Population (2015)

Somalia	10	176	10,787,104
South Sudan	11	175	12,339,812
Korea (North)	12	174	25,155,317
Syria	13	173	18,502,413
Libya	14	170	6,278,438
Yemen	14	170	26,832,215
Sudan	14	170	40,234,882
Afghanistan	15	169	32,526,562
Guinea-Bissau	16	168	1,844,325
Venezuela	17	166	31,108,083
Iraq	17	166	36,423,395

This makes Somalia as the most corrupt country on earth. Only one of these countries is in the Americas, Venezuela. The second worst such country is Haiti, with a score of 20.

Table 2. Least corrupt countries

Country	CPI2016 Score	Rank	Population (2015)
New Zealand	90	1	4,595,700
Denmark	90	1	5,676,002
Finland	89	3	5,482,013
Sweden	88	4	9,798,871
Switzerland	86	5	8,286,976
Norway	85	6	5,195,921
Singapore	84	7	5,535,002
Netherlands	83	8	16,936,520
Canada	82	9	35,851,774
Germany	81	10	81,413,145
Luxembourg	81	10	569,676
United Kingdom	81	10	65,138,232

Of these thirteen countries, ten are in Western Europe. But where is the USA? It has a score of 74 and is ranked 18^th worldwide. I suppose that a part of the score is overall perception by residents. For example, in the USA, there is an undertow of dissatisfaction by many. This reduces the overall score.

There is little overall correlation of corruption with population, but the average score (lowest average rank) for Western Europe far exceeds the next (least) corrupt region, the Americas. Third least corrupt of the regions are the countries of the Asian Pacific. The most corrupt region is sub Saharan Africa.

Have a favorite country? Go to the website below. Check it out.

* http://www.transparency.org/news/feature/corruption_perceptions_index_2016#regional

Human Simulation is Possible - by Humans

Human Simulation: Agent-Based Modeling and the Computational Case for Our Reality 1. Introduction In the essay, we introduce the notion that humanity could be a deliberate simulation based on an extremely simple single-celled organism, hardly anything more complex than that. This will allow an (apparently) new interpretation of the notion that humanity is simulated, but that there is no master engineer at a massive number of dials and switches, responsible for every twist and turn of our universe and lives. We begin with the notion that the universe exists and operates under its own laws. So, given the Earth [2] , when and where life first began, it was infused with a living agent, self-actualized, reproductive, and with other basic rules for its operations, interactions, and much of what single-celled organisms do today. The idea from this occurred some years back when writing code in ActionScript (formerly Flash), I was able to create...

The Calculus of Ideas and Patterns

Introduction. When dealing with ideas, patterns, intuition, and brainstorming, we need operations or rules not unlike those of arithmetic. The goal is not proof, a finished device, or a fait accompli , but rather a foundation for further investigation and study. In some cases, these operations may yield a proposition, that is, something capable of being proved. In this sense, they form a practical logic of intuition. The article concludes with a few select examples from a variety of venues. Setting. We are working with a given idea, problem, or project, or simply just thinking. Our aim is to discover pathways, patterns, or conceptual connections that may be useful. The following operations describe ways in which ideas and patterns can be generated, transformed, or refined. These also work toward understanding the imagination. Yet, this framework is distinguished from formal logic and proof. We are tempted to call them as “soft logic” because while nothing is proved, reasons...

Freedom of Speech

Think of freedom of speech as a living organism. Then think of what is required for it to survive. Coming to mind are a population agreeable to its constitution (its environment) and the institutions (its nutrients) that keep it healthy. Currently, many institutions, including some political parties, question unfettered freedom of speech and are working to deny it, claiming it is unhealthy for the body politic. Yes? No?

First Blog

Search This Blog