Trust Me, The Financial World will Change Forever if Wall Street Starts Analyzing Financial Data like

we do Baseball Stats Illustration of Miguel Cabrera Batting Stats And the Baseball Work Function
75

y = hx + c = 0.6x 38.4 Cabreras four-game stretch, May, 2013 Season

70

May 23 (184, 72)

Hits, y

May 19 (173, 67)

65

(169, 63)
60 160 165 170 175 180 185 190

At Bats, x
Figure 1: The At Bats-Hits diagram for the four-game stretch of Miguel Cabrera from May 19, 2013 to May 23, 2013. The linear law y = hx + c = h(x x0) = 0.6x 38.4 = 0.6 (x 64) describes this four-game stretch with the 3 home run game falling above the straight line labeled A.
Page | 1

1. Summary
The Detroit Tigers star player Miguel Cabreras baseball batting stats (he was in the news a couple of days ago) is discussed here to illustrate the meaning of Einsteins idea of a work function, outside physics. Cabreras four game stretch from May 19, 2013 to May 23, 2013, has been the topic of discussion in the baseball world, and was also the subject of an interesting video clip (home run GIF). It is shown here that an understanding of the significance of what we call the high batting average in this four game stretch will also lead to a better understand of many other complex problems in the business world, and in the so-called soft sciences, where we now use simple y/x ratios to make sense of our (x, y) observations. However, this focus of the behavior of the y/x ratio has led to a general lack of appreciation of the nature of the underlying x-y relation, which can be either linear (of the type y= hx +c, as in many commonly observed in many problems) or nonlinear (y = mxne-ax as in the traffic fatality problem). The reason for the often bewildering variation in the y/x ratio can be understood if we pay attention to the nonzero intercept c which appears in many problems, as we can appreciate from an analysis of the baseball batting stats. This nonzero intercept is shown to be related to the missing hits in baseball and to the work function conceived by Einstein to explain the phenomenon known as photoelectricity.

2. Introduction
My original objective, when I started writing this article earlier today was to invoke Detroit Tigers Miguel Cabreras baseball batting stats (he was in the news couple days ago) to talk about the idea of a work function, as a part of another discussion (traffic fatality statistics and the recent uptick in the US highway fatalities, from 32,367 deaths in 2011 to 340,080 death (estimated) in 2012, after six years of straight decline, form 2005). Cabreras four game stretch from May 19, 2013 to May 23, 2013, was the topic of discussion and also the subject of interesting video clip (home run GIF).
Page | 2

Miguel Cabreras Batting Stats in 2013 season, through May 23, 2013
Date 4/1/2013 3-Apr 4-Apr 5-Apr 6-Apr 7-Apr 9-Apr 10-Apr 11-Apr 12-Apr 13-Apr 14-Apr 16-Apr 17-Apr 18-Apr 19-Apr 20-Apr 21-Apr 24-Apr 25-Apr 26-Apr 27-Apr 28-Apr 29-Apr 30-Apr Game 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 AB 5 4 4 2 4 4 5 5 4 5 4 4 5 6 4 4 3 4 3 4 4 5 4 2 4 102 3 5 4 4 4 4 5 5 5 4 4 3 5 Hits 0 2 1 0 4 0 4 2 1 1 0 1 3 1 1 3 1 2 2 1 2 2 2 0 1 37 2 2 1 4 1 1 2 2 1 2 0 2 1 HR Cum AB, x 5 9 13 15 19 23 28 33 37 42 46 50 55 61 65 69 72 76 79 83 87 92 96 98 102 Cum Hits, y 0 2 3 3 7 7 11 13 14 15 15 16 19 20 21 24 25 27 29 30 32 34 36 36 37 Cum BA, y/x 0 0.222 0.231 0.200 0.368 0.304 0.393 0.394 0.378 0.357 0.326 0.320 0.345 0.328 0.323 0.348 0.347 0.355 0.367 0.361 0.368 0.370 0.375 0.367 0.363 0.363 0.371 0.373 0.368 0.390 0.385 0.381 0.382 0.382 0.376 0.379 0.369 0.375 0.369 Page | 3

1 1 4

5/1/2013 2-May 3-May 4-May 5-May 8-May 9-May 10-May 11-May 12-May 13-May 14-May 15-May

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

105 110 114 118 122 126 131 136 141 145 149 152 157

39 41 42 46 47 48 50 52 53 55 55 57 58

16-May 17-May 18-May 19-May 21-May 22-May 23-May Monthly

14 15 16 17 18 19 20

4 4 4 4 4 4 3 82

1 3 1 4 1 2 2 35

3 1 1 1 10

161 165 169 173 177 181 184

59 62 63 67 68 70 72

0.366 0.376 0.373 0.387 0.384 0.387 0.391

Data source: http://espn.go.com/mlb/player/gamelog/_/id/5544/miguelcabrera Then, as I started presenting the batting stats analysis, I added the Wall Street part to the title. Yes, I truly believe the financial world will change forever and the US and world economy will boom again if every single person on Wall Street, every single financial guru and Wall Street analyst, and every single economist who uses ratios, like the debt/GDP ratio, starts doing what I have described below with baseball batting stats. The ratio y/x is NOT the same as the ratio y/x. The easiest way to understand the difference is to look at what we do with baseball batting stats. Instead of At Bats x and Hits y, the Wall Street analyst is dealing with revenues x and profits y. The ratio y/x is called the Batting Average in baseball. The ratio y/x is called the profit margin on Wall Street. Likewise, to develop the Airlines Quality Ratings (AQR scores), we use various ratios like the On-Time (OT) arrival ratios to rate airlines. There is no name given as yet to the Debt/GDP ratio for a nation, but its use (or rather ABUSE) has devastating consequences as illustrated by one of the recent economic controversies the Reinhart-Rogoff coding errors. The graduate student, Thomas Herndon, who found the Microsoft Excel coding errors in an influential paper by two Harvard economists on the Debt/GDP ratio and its effect on economic growth, uses the baseball batting average to discuss how the debt/GDP ratios of various countries should be weighted to study the long term effects of high debts. I do not want to digress too much here and will simply refer the reader to the references cited at the end of this article.

Page | 4

3. Miguel Cabreras recent four-game stretch

Lets return to baseball stats but with this bigger picture in mind as well. Everyone who uses such numbers and stats can learn from a careful study of the baseball stats. According to baseball sportswriters (see a few references cited), Cabrera is now on a home run tear with a home run in four consecutive games and an unheard of batting four-game batting average (BA) of 0.600, from May 19 to May 23. His game-by-game (x, y) scores are (4, 4), (4, 1), (4, 2), and (3, 2) for a total four-game score (15, 9), see Table. Here x is the number of At Bats and y the number of Hits. Hence, for the four-game BA = y/x = 9/15 = 0.600. This stretch includes the score of (4, 4) on May 19 which includes the 3 home runs against Texas and a home run in each of the three games that followed. Let us take a look at these stats to illustrate what I have previously referred to as the baseball work function; see the recent articles on Babe Ruth and the Hamilton. The idea of a work function is a very important one and so baseball is taking the center stage even in serious scientific discussions about traffic fatalities (you can blame me for that) and also economic policy discussions (the Reinhart-Rogoff errors debate), as noted above. The batting average (BA) of a baseball player is a simple y/x ratio, where the numerator y is the number of Hits and the denominator x is the number of At Bats. However, consider, for a moment, what we have done when we talk about a four game stretch with a batting average of 0.600. The game on May 19, 2013, was the 17th game played by Cabrera in May 2013. Entering into this game, see batting stats below, his cumulative AB for the month (addition of all the AB for the games played in May) had climbed to x = 169 and the cumulative hits had climbed to 63. This is illustrated in the x-y diagram of Figure 1. At this point, his BA was 63/169 = 0.373. Then on May 19, Cabrera had a PERFECT single game BA with a (x, y) score of (4, 4) which included the 3 home runs. This was followed with a (4, 1) on May
Page | 5

21, with a home run, and a (4, 2) on May 22 with another home run, and then a (3, 2) on May 23 with a home run for the fourth consecutive game. His cumulative AB = 184 on May 23 and cumulative hits H = 72 for a batting average of 72/184 = 0.391. However, when we talk about this four-game stretch we are only considering the change in the hits, or the additional hits, y = 9 and the change in the AB, or the additional AB, x = 15, to arrive at the four game BA, y/x = 9/15 = 0.600. In other words, heres an elegant example of the important mathematical property of a straight line: the ratio y/x is NOT the same as the ratio y/x even on a straight line. The general equation of a straight line is y = hx + c, not y = mx. Hence, the ratio y/x = m = h + (c/x) keeps on changing as move up or down a straight line, such as the line labeled A in Figure 1. The mathematical equation of this straight line is y = 0.600x 38.4 = 0.6(x 64). The slope h and the intercept c can be determined readily using the following equations from our middle school math. Slope h = (y2 y1)/(x2 x1) = y/x Intercept c = (y1- hx1) = (y2 hx2) ..(1) ..(2)

Any two points on any x-y graph can always be joined by such a straight line. Here we have used the start and end of the four game stretch. We must obviously include the game of May 18 in the analysis since this is our starting point. Because of the nonzero c, and because it also has a negative value, Cabreras BA keeps increasing even as the AB increases as he moves up this line. Notice how all the (x, y) pairs line up along the line A although the equation of the line was determined by considering the two end points. Also, notice that the game with the PERFECT score (4, 4) falls slightly above this line. That was Cabreras best performance in this stretch.

Page | 6

75

y = hx + c = 0.6x 38.4 Cabreras four-game stretch, May, 2013 Season

70

May 23 (184, 72)

Hits, y

May 19 (173, 67)

65

(169, 63)
60 160 165 170 175 180 185 190

At Bats, x
Figure 1: The AB-Hits diagram for the four-game stretch of Miguel Cabrera from May 19, 2013 to May 23, 2013. The linear law y = hx + c = h(x x0) = 0.6x 38.4 = 0.6 (x 64) describes this four-game stretch with the 3 home run game falling above the straight line labeled A.

Now, imagine doing the same with profits and revenues data for a company, or the debt and GDP values of a country (over time), or the OnTime arrivals for an airline (x is number of flights and y is the number of OTs), or the Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) and the traffic fatalities y for an individual state or the US taken as a whole. If we were applying this same logic, that anyone can follow, the world would change forever. Indeed, everyone already knows this. I have merely called attention to this and have used the x-y diagram to illustrate what is going on when we talk about the incredible 0.600 batting average of our favorite baseball player, or some other sports heros stats in any other sport.
Page | 7

Let us now see how this linear law evolves and what the nonzero intercept c means in this problem. It is easy to understand the significance of the slope h. The slope h tells us the rate of increase of hits as the ABs increase, or h = y/x. It can be compared to the marginal tax rate, which tells us how tax owed y will increase as the taxable income x increases, over a limited range of income (the tax bracket as it is called, see Babe Ruth article). Or, it can be compared to the fixed speed, or velocity v, of a moving vehicle. The velocity v = x/t where x is the additional distance traveled in the additional time t. If the speed is 60 mph, the car is travel a fixed distance of one mile in one minute. Or, we can think of this as the fixed rate of fuel consumption of the car, or the fixed rate of depletion of the batterys charge, if one is driving an electric vehicle like the Tesla Model S (much in the news now, I had analyzed the profits and revenues data for Tesla, using such methods, with projections made which showed its potential profitability, more than one quarter ago, see references). Or, we can use the baseball analogy to explain these other complex problems of every day interest and talk about the four-game stretch here to illustrate how profits also increase at a fixed rate as revenues increase between quarters, or between years. Many companies show the same movement in the profits-revenues diagram as we see here in the At Bats-Hits diagram.

3. Evolution of the Linear Law

If we consider the game-by-game batting stats of a player (example the legendary Babe Ruth, or another contemporary player like Hamilton, see Refs. [47-49]), we again find that the x-y graph is described by the same general equation y = hx + c. For a legendary player like Babe Ruth, in the batting logs, we will find (x, y) scores for individual games such as (0,0), (1, 1), (2, 2), (3, 3). In other words, y = x. For just these games, the player has the PERFECT batting average of y/x = 1.

Page | 8

If we consider more games, we find scores like (1, 0), (2, 1), (3, 2), (4, 3) and even (6, 5) for Babe Ruth. In other words, y = x + c = x 1 and the batting average BA = y/x = 1 (1/x) has deviated from the PERFECT value of 1.000. If we analyze more games, we will find scores like (2, 0), (3, 1), (4, 2), (5, 3) and so on. Now, y = x + c = x 2. Again, the BA y/x = 1 (2/x) is less than the PERFECT value. In general, the batting average BA = y/x = 1 + (c/x) deviates from the perfect batting average because of the missing hits. If we prepare a x-y graph (see also the articles on Ruth and Hamilton), for the individual games, the batting stats can be described by a series of parallels with the slope h = 1 but with an intercept c = 0, c = -1, or c = -2, which depends on the number of missing hits. This is illustrated here in Figure 2 for Miguel Cabreras batting stats for his 2013 season to date (through the game on May 23).
6 5

(4, 4)
4

(5, 4)

Hits, y

3 2 1 0 0 1 2 3 4 5

(5, 3)

At Bats, x
Figure 2: Miguel Cabrera, Game-by-Game Stats in 2013 Season, through May 24, 2013. In this season, during the last four games, Cabrera had a batting average of 0.600. He had the PERFECT BA of 4/4 = 1.000 in three games in this season (on 4/6/13, 5/4/13 and 5/19/13 with 2 home runs on 5/4 and 3 Home Runs on
Page | 9

5/19). The (5, 3) score was achieved once and (5, 2) three times. It is clear that the game-by-games performance is a series of parallels with the general equation y = x + c and the BA = y/x = 1 + (c/x) where c = 0, -1, -2, etc. is the missing hits. The nonzero intercept c is the work function for the player and tells us something about the missing hits. When the game-by-game stats are aggregated by monthly At Bats and Hits, the x-y graph reveal the more general linear law y = hx + c where BA = y/x = h + (c/x) and the slope h < 1 and the intercept c can be either positive or negative depending on the skill of the baseball player. For Cabrera, in this best season (2011) to date, y = 0.342 4.8. In the 2011 season, his BA = y/x 197/572 = 0.344 and approached the maximum value predicted by the linear law, since y/x = 0.342 (4.8/x). The BA depends on the number of At Bats x and increases as At Bats increase since c < 0. The maximum BA equals the slope h of the best-fit line, see Figure A2. Now, if we start aggregating the data, on a weekly basis, or monthly basis, or by seasons, we will see the more general law y = hx +c. Amazingly, the x-y graph continues to be linear but the slope h < 1 and the intercept c is either positive or negative, see Cabreras 2011 season which is his best full season to date. The numerical value of c clearly depends on the missing hits, or the skill of the baseball player. For Babe Ruth, in his career best season (when he set the single season home run record of 60), the intercept c < 0 and the BA = y/x = h + (c/x) keeps on increasing as the At bats x increase. Babe seems to be getting better the more he bats. For his Yankee team-mate, Lou Gehrig, on the other hand, we find that the intercept c > 0. Now, the BA = y/x keeps on decreasing as x increases. The perception created by the positive intercept c is that the player is not doing well the more he bats. For Cabrera, we find that the slope h = 0.600 in his four-game stretch but the BA, the ratio y/x, is lower but keeps on increasing. This is due to the negative intercept c. If Cabrera were to continue moving up the same line, his BA would keep increasing. However, we will soon see him jumping off this line if the BA starts falling again. This means the work function, or the nonzero intercept c has changed. The change in the intercept c is just as important as
Page | 10

the changes in the slope h. We tend to usually think only about increasing the rate h of some desirable quantity, like the BA or the profit margin. But, closely associated with the change in h, is the change in the intercept c. This is reflected in the value of the intercept made on the horizontal axis, or the xaxis which is given by x = x0 = -c/h, see Figure 3 for the season 2013 start.
20

16

Cumulative Hits, y

y = hx + c = 0.5x 2.5 Cabreras first ten games in April 2013, Season start

(37, 14) (33, 13)

12

(23, 7) (15, 3)

0 0 10 20 30 40 50

Cumulative At Bats, x
Figure 3a: The first ten games of Cabreras 2013 season. In the first game on April 1, Cabreras score was (5, 0). For the second game it was (4, 2), for a cumulative value of (9, 2). The equation of the line joining cumulative scores at the end of games 1 and 2 is y = 0.5x 2.5. Likewise, the straight line, y = 0.5x 4.5 joins the two points representing the scores at the end of games 4 and 6, with scores of (15, 3) and (23, 7). These two points are below the primary line drawing here and fall on a parallel to the primary line established after games 1 and 2. Cabrera has been moving back and forth between these parallels, see Figure 3b, which represents small fluctuations in his work function. Is this a coincidence? NO! NO!! NO!!! There are literally hundreds of such

Page | 11

examples that we can find in baseball, and in the financial, economic, and other data from the social, political, and medical sciences. Both the slope h and the intercept c are reflected in this cut-off value of x, the minimum value x above which we start seeing the appearance of profits, hits, traffic fatalities, etc. This is illustrated in Figure 3 by considering the batting stats for Cabrera in his first ten games of the season. There is a nonzero intercept c = 5, the missing hits, since Cabreras score in game number 1 of the season was (5, 0). For the second game, the score was (4, 2), or a cumulative of (9, 2) or h = y/x = 0.500, and y = 0.5x 2.5 for the first two games. The BA increased from BA = 0.000 to BA = 2/9 = 0.222 after game two but the initial hitting rate h = 0.500 was much higher than BA. The BA increased to 0368 at (19, 7) after game 5 when Cabrera returned to the same line. The increasing BA is due to the negative intercept c = -2.5 or the cut-off value on the x-axis of x0 = c/h = -(-2.5)/0.5 = 5, the first games At Bat with zero hits.
20

15

Cumulative Hits, y

(37, 14)
10

(23, 7) (15, 3)

0 0 -5 10 20 30 40 50

Cumulative At Bats, x
Figure 3b: The first ten games of Cabreras 2013 season illustrate a movement along the two parallels shown here. The first two games established the primary
Page | 12

line (solid line), with the equation y = 0.5x 2.5 with slope h = 0.5 and intercept c = - 2.5. Then, we find the data at the end of three other games (15, 3), (23, 7) and (37, 14), games 4, 6, and 9 fall on another parallel, y = 0.5x 4.5 with h = 0.5 and c = - 4.5. Cabrera fluctuates in and out of these two parallels and keeps returning to the primary line. In the other words, the work function is changing slightly. But, then after game 9, we see the BIG change and a very significant deviation out of these two parallels.
50 40

Cumulative Hits, y

30 20

(83, 30) (65, 21)

10 0 0 -10 20 40 60 80 100 120

Cumulative At Bats, x
-20

Figure 3c: Cabreras performance at the end of all the 25 games played in the month of April 2013 is considered here. Take a look again at the (65, 21) and (83, 30) at the end of games 15 and 20. What do you see? Again y = 9 x = 18 and the slope h = y/x = 0.500. Am I imaging this movement along parallel? Do you think my daytime job is painting park lots, with parallels, of course? Now the work function has changed, c = y2 hx2 = y1 hx1 = 30 (0.5*83) = -11.5 = 21 (0.5*65) and Cabrera is operating on a third parallel with slope h = 0.50 and c = - 11.5. Also, the numerical value of x0 = -c/h = -(-11.5/0.5) = 23 has increased by x0 = 5 to x0 = 9 earlier in the month.

Page | 13

Nevertheless, this too is an incredible stretch of games with a BA of 0.500 but alas it did NOT catch our attention because there were no big booming homers like Cabrera got when the recent four-game stretch started with a home run in four consecutive games and three home runs in a single game when it started. There was also a stretch with BA = 10/18 = 0.555 between games 4 and 8 with scores ending (15, 3) and (33, 13). In a conversation, during an evening walk after tea at a Physics Conference (as recalled by Werner Heisenberg), Einstein told the young Heisenberg (who got the Nobel Prize in physics for his Uncertainty Principle), much to the latters surprise, It is theory that decides what we observe. (click here and here and also here for a more detailed discussion of this conversation by historian Gerald Holton of Harvard University; see also Einsteins God in reference list and what Eddington observed during the total solar eclipse on May 29, 1919.) Yes, I think, I must really believe in this generalized idea of the theory of a work function for every observable problem (actually developed by Einstein), and so I can observe these parallels. If you learn to appreciate the idea of a work function, believe me, the world will be in giant parking lot. It will be parallels, parallels, parallels, all around you. Notice also that the cumulative scores at the end game 4 (15, 3) and game 6 (23, 7) scores fall below the line. However, we can compute y = 4 and x = 8 and the slope h = y/x = 0.500, the same as the slope of the primary line through game 1. The equation of this line is y =0.5x 4.5 and the intercept has changed from c = -2.5 to c = -4.5, similar to the changes in intercept with missing hits when we consider the game-by-game performance. In other words, Cabrera has moved from one parallel to the next and back again to the first one. We are witnessing a fluctuation in the baseball work function. At the end of game 5 with the perfect (4, 4), the cumulative had climbed to (19, 7) but the slope h = 0.500 again. The data deviated from the initial slope h = 0.500, then returned to it, and then deviated again. We see a significant deviation after game 8.

Page | 14

4. Brief Discussion and Conclusion

As noted at the very outset, the baseball stats analyzed here is simply a way to understand many complex problems that engage our attention. The same considerations apply with many other problems like traffic fatalities that have engaged my attention recently, after the uptick in the US traffic fatalities was reported (following six years of record low traffic fatalities).

250

Cumulative Monthly Hits, y

200

y = hx + c = 0.342x 4.8 r2 = 0.994 Cabrera 2011 Season

150

100

50

0 0 100 200 300 400 500 600 700

Cumulative Monthly At Bats, x

Figure 4: Miguel Cabrera, Aggregated monthly batting stats is plotted here for the 2011 season. Each (x, y) pair represents the At Bats and Hits at the end of the month, i.e., aggregate the game-by-game stats into monthly stats and then aggregate them as the season progresses. For the 2006 season, his second best season to date, we see the same pattern, with y = 0.338x + 0.087 with r2 = 0.9987. Like the game-by-game batting stats, we can consider the evolution of the traffic fatalities graph, one accident at a time, and consider first the data for a single county, then the aggregated data for a state, and then the
Page | 15

data for the whole country. With one fatal accident, only a single vehicle, there is at least one fatality. But, we might also have more than one fatality if there is more than one occupant, or more than one vehicle involved in the accident. Suffice to say, this is how the linear law evolves, one accident at a time, like the linear law for batting stats. (I have studied county-by-county data for states like Florida using this approach.) To conclude our discussion, I have included two additional plots. In Figure 4, we consider the full 2011 season with each point here representing the aggregated monthly batting stat. The best-fit line has the slope h = 0.342 and Cabreras season ending BA had approached the limiting value (exceeded slightly, a statistical fluctuation) given by this slope. Recall BA = y/x = h + (c/x) = 0.342 (4.8/x) was increasing as the season progressed.

50

2012-2013; h = y/x = 12/18 2006-2007; h = y/x = 6/8

Month of April Hits, y

40

(102, 37)
30

20

y = hx + c = 0.667 (31/x) Cabrera April 20004-2013 Seasons

(84, 25)

10

0 0 20 40 60 80 100 120

Month of April At Bats, x

Figure 5: Miguel Cabreras aggregated batting stats for games played in April of each season (from 2004 to 2013, for 2003 season he started in June) is plotted here. The straight line joining the data for 2012 and 2013 season has a slope h =
Page | 16

y/x = 12/18 = 2/3. The data for two other seasons fall along this line. The April BA = y/x for these four seasons, increases from 0.298 in 2012 to 0.363 in 2013 as we move up the line, with the BA of 0.274 in 2008 and 0.344 in 2011 seasons. In other words, if y = hx + c, y/x = h + (c/x) = 0.667 (31/x) is confirmed and the nonzero c reduces the BA below the maximum value of h = 0.667 in this case. For 2006 and 2007, Cabrera has a higher slope h = 68 = = 0.75. The analysis of the batting stats here is exactly analogous to analyzing the traffic fatality stats for a single quarter, say the first quarter, of each year.

Cabreras stats for just the month of April, in all seasons, is plotted in Figure 5. Once again we see the same linear law. However, as we see here, some points fall above the line that seems to define the best performance of Cabrera. Here we do not use the statistical procedure of linear regression, quite intentionally. The high slope of h = 0.667 means that Cabrera is able to convert 2 out of 3 additional At Bats into Hits, in the best of conditions. If we examine the three points that fall above this line, the stats for April 2006 and 2007, we get a slope of 0.75 from monthly scores of (78, 25) and (86, 31). With 8 additional AB, Cabrera was able to convert them into six additional Hits, or a hitting rate of h = 6/8 = 0.75. Of course, such a high hitting rate was not observed but these calculations illustrate the potential of the player, at their peak performance. Today, Tigers fans are relishing the four game stretch of their star player. The changes in the baseball work function, a rather complex quantity, determine the performance of the player. Perhaps, the two dimensional diagrams used here will help baseball players to improve their own performance. But, importantly, I sincerely, this discussion will help Wall Street financial analysts and illustrate what they are missing when they use y/x ratios like the profit margin, and myriad other such ratios to analyze the financial performance of a company. And, I also hope economists, grappling with vexing issues like the Debt/GDP ratio will be able to gain some fresh insights as well.
Page | 17

For completeness, a brief discussion of the work function, as first conceived by Einstein to explain the photoelectric effect is included in Appendix 1. The same work function appears in the form of the nonzero intercept c in many problems, outside physics, of great importance and interest. The baseball analogy was meant to help us understand the meaning of the work function outside physics. The work function provided an explanation for one of the puzzles posed by photoelectricity. It also changed our view of the physical world, in a fundamental way, and led to the acceptance of the quantum theory conceived by Max Planck in December 1900. It was Einsteins photoelectric law that eventually forced physicists to take a serious look at what Planck had done with his idea of an elementary energy quantum. But equally important is the nonzero work function W, or c = - W, in the world outside physics.

Imagine an anointed financial guru, conducting week long seminars, starting with session 1 on the baseball stats and Einsteins law and sessions 2 and 3 discussing the performance of companies like Microsoft, Apple, Google, Yahoo, Ford Motor Company, etc. both companies that are struggling and those that are doing well. Indeed, the financial performance of these companies has already been discussed in several articles, using exactly similar methods, the first one posted since the Facebook IPO, May 19, 2012; see articles listed in bibliography, Ref. [26]. The appearance of a maximum point on the profits-revenues graphs of several companies, like Ford and Yahoo, and its implications, has, quite surprisingly, escaped the attention of the financial world and also the CEOs of the companies mentioned since the focus has always been on the y/x ratio, the profit margin, rather than the x-y relation, or the profits-revenues diagrams.

Page | 18

45 40

BA = y/x = 30/83 = 0.361

Cumulative Hits, y

35 30 25 20

15
10 5 0 0 20 40 60 80 100 120

BA = y/x = 3/15 = 0.200

Cumulative At Bats, x
Figure 6: Miguel Cabreras aggregated batting stats for games played in April of the 2013 season. His batting average was 0.000 after game 1 (5, 0) and increased as the month progressed ending BA = 0.363 with game 25 (102, 37). The familiar BA is the slope of the ray joining an individual (x, y) pair back to the origin (0, 0), as illustrated here. The two rays illustrating the scores (15, 3) and (83, 30) have slope of BA = y/x = 3/15 = 0.200 and BA = y/x = 30/83 = 0.361. While others see these rays emerging from the origin and the increasing batting average, I am able to see the parallels as illustrated here and the changing baseball work function. Ultimately, like Einstein told Heisenberg, It is theory that decides what we observe, or can observe.

It is theory that decides what we can observe. Einstein during a conversation with Werner Heisenberg, who enunciated the famous Uncertainty Principle in Quantum Physics. Rays or Parallels? That depends on what theory you use.
Page | 19

Appendix 1: Einsteins Photoelectric Law and the Work Function in Physics

The following schematic diagrams are copied from Ref. [49].

Page | 20

The idea of a work function was first conceived by Einstein, in 1905, to explain a puzzling observation made by Lenard in his photoelectricity experiments. Lenard was an assistant of Heinrich Hertz. The latter was the first to show that electromagnetic waves (radio waves) can be produced in the laboratory using electrical equipment, as predicted by Maxwells theory of electromagnetism. We now use the term Hertz for the unit of frequency (as GHz and MHz for computer performance capabilities and radio wave frequencies.) Lenard followed up on a curious observation made by Hertz - a spark seems to be produced when ultraviolet light strikes the surface of a metal. In follow up experiments (Hertz died at a young age), Lenard showed that this spark is due to electrons which are ejected from within the metal surface. The electrons can be collected and made to flow in an electrical circuit. However, rather strangely, Lenard observed that no electrons are produced unless a minimum frequency, the cut-off frequency, f0 , of light is exceeded. To produce electrons, the frequency f > f0 and this depends on the metal being studied. Increasing the intensity of light has no effect (see also the discussion by Millikan in the introduction to his 1916 papers on photoelectricity). This puzzling observation could not be explained on the basis of the wave view of light, the very essence of Maxwells electromagnetic theory which had been proved eloquently by the production of electromagnetic waves in the laboratory. Regardless, Lenard received the Nobel Prize in 1905, the same year, a young Einstein came up with an interesting explanation for the cut-off frequency observed by Lenard. In his famous 1905 paper, Einstein first shows (by discussing ideas such as entropy, energy, and temperature associated with a finite volume of space that is filled with light radiation) that light can be thought of as a stream of particles called photon. This was a revolutionary thought process back then since physicists believed that light is a wave of electromagnetic origin. Newton had proposed the idea of light being a stream of particles which obeyed his laws of motion. According to Newton, each color of the rainbow, or each color
Page | 21

observed when a prism decomposes white light into its component colors, corresponds to light particles having a different momentum mv where m is the mass of the light particle and v the speed of light (we now use the symbol c for speed of light, thanks to Einstein!) But, Einstein gave this old discredited idea a new twist and so prompted the attention of experimenters. Each photon, Einstein said, must have an energy equal to the elementary quantum (which was then a brand new idea), first conceived by Planck, in December 1900. Then Einstein writes the following simple equation which changed physics and our conception of light giving rise to what is also known as the dual view of light, or matter in general; see article by Ekspong. Einstein states that the maximum kinetic energy of the electron produced will be K = W where W is the work function, a property associated with the metal on which the photons strike. Some work must be done to get the electron out of the metal. Hence, a minimum energy W is required. No electrons are produced if < W. Since = hf, where h is the Planck constant, it follows that K = hf W = h(f f0) where f0 = W/h or W = hf0 . The Lenard cut-off frequency is thus a manifestation of the property called the work function, of a metal. It tells us something about the difficulty of producing an electron in this complex interaction between a photon and an electron. How factors must be considered in the production of electrons. When the photon strikes the electron, is 100% of the energy of the photon transferred to the electron? How does this collision occur? What is the angle at which the photon striking the electron? What is the environment in which the electron is present in the metal? What are the forces binding the electron to the metal? Or, to use the baseball analogy, producing an electron is just like producing a Hit in baseball, or a Home Run. Or, to use the baseball analogy for those who have trouble understanding physics, producing an electron, is like producing a Hit in baseball. Einsteins law can be rewritten, using very
Page | 22

general mathematical symbols as y = hx + c = h(x x0) where x0 = -c/h is like the cut-off frequency of Lenard and c = - W is like the work function. Since h is a universal constant, Einsteins law implies that the K-f graph is a straight line with the slope h. Hence, the value of the universal constant can be determined directly by experiments with different metals. Also, if we consider the data for different metals, the K-f graph will be a family of parallel lines each having the slope h the Planck constant. This is also observed in baseball, as just discussed, see also the discussion of Babe Ruths stats and the projections for Hamilton for the 2013 season. The work function, or the nonzero intercept c, is related to the missing hits. The baseball work function tells us about the difficulty of producing hits (or home runs, if we prepare a graph of At Bats versus Home Runs). Thus, the baseball analogy can be used to understand many complex problem where we find a nonzero intercept c relating our observations on the variable x and y. And, the missing hits, or the baseball work function, is also like the work function of Einstein. Many complex problems have a nonzero intercept that we must recognize. Often we use y/x ratios without recognizing the significance of the x-y relation. Often it is a simple relation like y = hx + c. But the ratio y/x = h + (c/x) keeping changing as x increases and can either increase or decrease depending on the numerical values of h and c. Three cases must be considered along with their inverses, where inverse refers to decreasing values of x instead of increasing values of x. In baseball At Bats x can only increase. But, in the real world, where the variable x has other meanings, we can see either an increase or a decrease of say revenues, the GDP, the Vehicle Miles Traveled, and so on. Type I (h > 0, c < 0): Positive slope, negative intercept. Both y and the ratio y/x increase as x increases, as we see with the batting average here with c < 0. The same applies for increasing profit margins with increasing revenues, or increasing fatalities with increasing VMT. Both the
Page | 23

rate as determined the ratio y/x and the response variable y increase together. (The inverse would the case when x is decreasing and y also decreases, with the rate going down instead of going up, as for say profit margins with decreasing profits and revenues.) Type II (h > 0, c > 0): Positive slope, positive intercept. The variable y increases with increasing x but the rate, as measured by the ratio y/x is decreasing. An example would be decreasing unemployment rate with increase in the number of unemployed! Or, increasing profits with increasing revenues, but decreasing profit margins, and so on. (The inverse would be the case of decreasing x.) Type III (h < 0, c > 0): Negative slope, positive intercept. Both y and the rate, as determined by the ratio y/x, decrease as x increases. An example is decreasing traffic fatalities y coupled with decreasing fatality rates, y/x, as observed in the US in recent years, with increasing VMT. (The inverse would the case of decreasing x, with increasing fatalities and increasing fatality rates.) As applied to baseball, the ratio y/x equals the batting average if y is hits and x is the At Bats. The BA keeps going up or down depending on the skill of the player, which determines where c is positive or negative. For Cabrera, c < 0 in his best season to date, the 2011 season. In the 2006 season, c > 0, and that was his second best season. Finally, for those who are very wise and are bound by disposition to distrust and express ridicule, scorn, contempt, aversion, and skepticism when being shoved in the face with such a downpour of linear laws, especially those among the business leaders, economists, Wall Street analysts, social scientists, biologists, and may be even medical researchers (often involved directly or indirectly in various fatality studies), please allow me to offer the following!
Page | 24

The three linear laws (and their inverses} taken together imply a nonlinear law. Variations in h and c are due to variations in the fundamental constants associated with the problem being analyzed, much like we see with baseball batting performance here. In the profits-revenues problem, for example, the constants h and c can be related to the three constants associated with fixed cost a, unit variable cost b and unit price p; see discussions on individual companies in the articles listed under bibliography. Consider the simple case of a company making and selling N units of a single product. The revenues R = pN where N is the units sold. The total costs C is the sum of the fixed cost and the variable costs. Thus, C = a + bN. Eliminating N, we can write, profits P = R C = pN a - bN. With some algebra, and using N = R/p, we get P = [(p b)/p]R a = hx + c which means the profits-revenues graph is a straight line. Here x is now being used for the revenues and y = P is the profits. The slope of the profits-revenues graph h = (p b)/p = 1 (b/p) is related to the ratio of the unit variable cost and the unit price (b/p). The nonzero intercept c = - a is the fixed cost. The breakeven point, when profits is zero, is the like the cut-off frequency in photoelectricity. The revenues are like the energy of the photon that shine on a company, which is like the metal substrate. Costs are like the work function, the energy that must be given up to produce the electron. Costs must be given up to produce profits from revenues. Now, the cut-off revenues, the breakeven point, x0 = - c/h = ab/(p b) and includes the three fundamental constants (a, b, p) of the profits-revenues problem. Thus, the variations in the three fundamental constants (a, b, p) gives rise to the nonlinearity and ultimately to the maximum point on the profits-revenues (x-y) graph which has been observed with several companies. The old General Motors went through such a maximum point and was operating past the peak on the falling portion of the profits-revenues curve in the 1990s and 2000s and was forced into bankruptcy. Other companies like Ford and Yahoo also exhibit this maximum and are considered to be struggling. This is due to change from Type I to Type II to Type III behavior, which occurs over a period time (where we only observe the linear law with changed values
Page | 25

of h and c, as also with batting stats here). This implies a changing slope and therefore a point where the slope dy/dx = 0 and there must be a maximum point on the x-y graph. The simplest mathematical function which describes this behavior is the power-exponential law, y = mxne-ax , also used by Einstein in 1905, Ref. [36], to show light must be a stream of photons. The nonlinear law, y = mxne-ax , is known to physicists as Wiens law, see Refs. [36-38], and it is also useful to describe the historical trends in US traffic fatality statistics, see Refs. [6-10]. My recent study of the uptick in traffic fatalities in 2012, Ref. [5], prompted this digression into a discussion of Cabreras batting stats (of course, also the four-game stretch which was in the news and caught my attention as well). Wiens law was modified by Planck and this modified law can be written as y = mxn [e-ax/(1 + be-ax)] + c Plancks blackbody radiation law ..(1) In Plancks original theory, b = -1. Wiens law is the case of b = 0. I have written these laws in a more generalized form permitting other values of b. In Plancks theory, the term within the square brackets [e-ax/(1 + be-ax)], is related to the average energy of a very large complex system of N particles in various energy states. Starting with the idea of an elementary energy quantum , Planck writes UN = NU = P where UN is the total energy of the N particle and U the average energy. Planck states that the product NU can also be written as P where both N and P are considered to be very very large integers. This is the birth of what we now call quantum physics. In quantum physics, we are dealing with trillions of trillions of trillions. After explaining the meaning of entropy, which arises from the complex distribution of the N particles (which can be computed using the elementary theory of permutations and combinations) into various energy states (the N particles are only allowed to have energies which are integral multiples of the elementary values, such as 0, , 2, 3 and so on), Planck arrives at the following expression for U U = [e-/kT/(1 + be-/kT)] ..(2)

Page | 26

Here k is a constant called the Boltzmann constant which appears in the expression for entropy SN = NS with S being average entropy of the system and SN = k ln being the total entropy and is the number of microstates leading to the same macrostate (of a fixed UN and therefore SN). The expression for is obtained from elementary theory of permutations and combinations (distributing N over P total ways to get UN = NU = P). The final step is the expression for temperature T = dS/dU. Performing this differentiation yields the expression for U given above which involves the exponential factors (factorials in the theory of permutations and combinations can be converted into exponents using Stirling's approximation, see details in the references cited, including my own version of the derivation of these expressions). = (N + P 1)! /(N 1)! P! (N + P)N+P /NN PP .(3)

I am convinced that these ideas can therefore be extended and applied to any problem of interest where U now means the average value of any property, not just energy. Thus, as I have stated in other articles, money in economics, is just like energy in physics. Entropy, of course, is related to chaos and complexity of the state, which gives rise to the various microstates for the same macrostate. With some imagination, we can also extend the meaning of temperature T, as used by Planck, to any system outside physics. Temperature T = dS/dU tells us about the rate of change of entropy (extent of chaos) as the energy (or some other property of interest) increases. From physics to baseball, to understand the work function, and back to any complex problem of interest, we have just completed the short journey to ___________________________________________
Imagine a large box which you want to divide into two parts or cells. You will need one partition, or divider, to make the two parts or cells. If you want to divide into four cells, you will need 3 dividers, and so on, with P cells you will need (P- 1) dividers. Each one of these subunits have N0, N1, N2 particles and so on until all N are divided into the P subspaces or cells. This gives the formula for used by Planck, later also discussed by Ehrenfest and ; see discussion by Longair in references cited.

Page | 27

understand many vexing issues of the day like the traffic fatalities problem (why did US traffic fatalities go up in 20102) profits-revenues problem or the airline quality problem, or the debt/GDP problem, or others like the unemployment problem, teenage pregnancy problem, gun violence, and so on. I have had the temerity to venture into all these discussions only because I understood, one fine day in the summer of 1998, that if a straight line does NOT pass through the origin, its equation is y = hx + c and therefore the ratio y/x = h + (c/x) is NOT a constant, even if the x-y relation is a perfect straight line. The ratio y/x will keep changing as x increases. Depending on the numerical values of the constants h and c we have three cases. When I first realized this, it hit me like a ton of bricks! (Now, the real world has taught me that we have six cases, if we include the inverses.) With a few additional steps, rationalizing the generalization of Plancks ideas and Einsteins ideas seemed quite easy, especially after I was able to derive all the entropy related equations given by Planck, see text of original paper in Ref. [38], or click here (on 329 under Planck). This is also what prompted the 100+ articles over a little more than a year (on the day Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg got married to his sweetheart Priscilla Chan, happy anniversary Mark and Priscilla!) that I have shared by posting them on the internet and, of course, talked about them with a few close friends who nodded their heads in enthusiastic approval as I told them how I was able to find parallels, and parallels, and parallels, all around me! Cheers!

You can go back to your rays. I am done with my parking lot for the day.
Page | 28

Reference List
1. Data sources: Miguel Cabrera Game-by-Game Stats, ESPN MLB, http://espn.go.com/mlb/player/gamelog/_/id/5544/miguel-cabrera 2. Watch Tigers Miguel Cabrera hit six home runs at once (kinda) 3. Tigers Miguel Cabrera continues on home run tear; extends streak to four consecutive games, May 23, 2013 http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20130523/SPORTS0104/30523042 9/1004/sports/Tigers-slugger-Miguel-Cabrera-extends-home-run-streakto-four-games A home run since May 19 (3 HR) in each game through May 23, 2013 4. Miguel Cabreras home run GIF shows why he is the most dangerous hitter in baseball, by Mike Oz, Big League Stew, May 24, 2013, http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mlb-big-league-stew/miguel-cabrerahome-run-gif-shows-why-most-193535766.html 5. Early Estimates of Motor Vehicle Traffic Fatalities in 2012, Traffic Safety Facts, May 2013, NHTSA DOT HS 811 741 http://wwwnrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pubs/811741.pdf 6. Is the Vehicle Miles Traveled (VMT) Even the Proper Metric to Determine US Traffic Fatality Rates? Published May 23, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/143168641/Is-Vehicle-Miles-Traveled-VMTEven-the-Proper-Metric-to-Determine-Traffic-Fatality-Rates ; see also posted using Facebook, http://www.scribd.com/doc/143156075/IsVehicle-Miles-Traveled-VMT-Even-the-Proper-Metric-to-DetermineTraffic-Fatality-Rates 7. The Correlation Between Highway Deaths and the US Economy, Published May 20, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/142526685/TheCorrelation-Between-Highway-Deaths-and-the-US-Economy 8. Highway Fatalities Trend shows it first uptick in Six Years: Predicting the Crossover with Firearms Deaths, Published May 18, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/142199172/Highway-Fatalities-TrendShows-Its-First-Uptick-in-Six-Years-Predicting-Crossover-with-FirearmsDeaths
Page | 29

http://www.freep.com/article/20130524/SPORTS02/305240114/detroittigers-miguel-cabrer fangraphs-gif May 24, 2013, Kirkland Crawford

9. Does Speed Kill? Forgotten US Highway Deaths in the 1950s and 1960s, August 3, 2012, http://www.scribd.com/doc/101982715/DoesSpeed-Kill-Forgotten-US-Highway-Deaths-in-1950s-and-1960s 10. The Effect of Speed Limits on Fatalities and Texas Proofing of Vehicles, August 3, 2012, http://www.scribd.com/doc/101983375/Effect-of-Speed-Limits-onFatalities-Texas-Proofing-of-Vehicles 11. Growth in a Time Before Debt, by Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth S. Rogoff, http://www.nber.org/papers/w15639.pdf NBER Series, Working Paper 15639. On page 11, Over the past two centuries, debt in excess of 90 percent has typically been associated with mean growth of 1.7 percent versus 3.7 percent when debt is low (under 30 percent of GDP), and compared with growth rates of over 3 percent for the two middle categories (debt between 30 and 90 percent of GDP). Of course, there is considerable variation across the countries, with some countries such as Australia and New Zealand experiencing no growth deterioration at very high debt levels. It is noteworthy, however, that those high-growth high-debt observations are clustered in the years following World War II. And, on page 23, Why are there thresholds in debt, and why 90 percent? This is an important question that merits further research, but we would speculate that the phenomenon is closely linked to logic underlying our earlier analysis of debt intolerance in Reinhart, Rogoff, and Savastano (2003). As we argued in that paper, debt thresholds are importantly country-specific and as such the four broad debt groupings presented here merit further sensitivity analysis. A general result of our debt intolerance analysis, however, highlights that as debt levels rise towards historical limits, risk premia begin to rise sharply, facing highly indebted governments with difficult tradeoffs. 12. Does High Public Debt Stifle Economic Growth? A Critique of Reinhart/Rogoff, by Thomas Herndon, Michael Ash, and Robert Pollin, http://www.peri.umass.edu/236/hash/31e2ff374b6377b2ddec04deaa63 88b1/publication/566/ April 15, 2013. 13. Guest Post: The Grad Student who took down Reinhart-Rogoff Explains Why Theyre Fundamentally Wrong, Business Insider, by
Page | 30

Thomas Herndon, April 22, 2013, http://www.businessinsider.com/herndon-responds-to-reinhart-rogoff2013-4 Herndon invokes the baseball batting average to discuss the equal weighting of debt/GDP ratios of various countries. 14. An MIT Non-Economists View of the Harvard-UMass Debt/GDP Ratio and Economic Growth Debate, Published April 26, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/138076426/An-MIT-Non-Economist-s-Viewof-the-Harvard-UMass-Debt-GDP-Ratio-and-the-Economic-Growth-Debate 15. Iceland Votes Against Austerity: Analysis of Icelands Debt-GDP, Published April 28, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/138345921/IcelandVotes-Against-Austerity-Analysis-of-Iceland-s-Debt-GDP-Data-2002-2012

16. A Brief Survey of the Debt-GDP Relations for Some Modern 21st Century Economies, Published May 1, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/138912093/A-Brief-Survey-of-the-DebtGDP-Relationship-for-Some-Modern-21st-Century-Economies 17. Airline Quality Report: An Analysis of On-Time Percentages, Published April 18, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/136760664/Airline-QualityReport-2013-Analysis-of-the-On-Time-Percentages 18. Airline Quality Rating 2013, Purdue University, e-Pubs, April 8, 2013, by Dr. Brent D. Bowen (Purdue University, College of Technology) and Dr. Dean E. Headley (Wichita State University, W. Frank Barton School of Business) http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/aqrr/23/ 19. Airline Quality Report 2013: An Analysis of On-Time Percentages, Published April 18, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/136760664/Airline-Quality-Report-2013Analysis-of-the-On-Time-Percentages 20. Babe Ruths 1923 Batting Statistics and Einsteins Work Function, Published April 17, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/136489156/BabeRuth-s-1923-Batting-Statistics-and-Einstein-s-Work-Function 21. Babe Ruth Batting Statistics and Einsteins Work Function, To be Published April 17, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/136556738/BabeRuth-Batting-Statistics-and-Einstein-s-Work-Function 22. Legendre, On Least Squares, English Translation of the original paper http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/maths/histstat/legendre.pdf

Page | 31

23. Line of Best-Fit, Least Squares Method, see worked example given http://hotmath.com/hotmath_help/topics/line-of-best-fit.html The formula for h used in this example is an actually approximate one and was used, before the advent of modern computers, since it only involves the determination of x2 and xy and the sum of all the values of x, y, x2 and xy. The exact formula, is given below, with xm and ym denoting the mean or average values of x and y in the data set, and ym = hxm + c since the bestfit line always passes through the point (xm , ym). h = (x xm)(y ym)/ (x xm)2 Determine the deviations of the individual x and y values from the mean, or average, (x xm) and (y ym). Determine the product (x xm)(y ym) and their sum. This gives the numerator in the expression for h. Determine the square (x xm)2 and the sum. This gives the denominator in the expression for h. This also fixes the intercept c via ym = hxm = c . Then, using the regression equation, determine the predicted value yb on the best-fit line and the vertical deviation (y yb) and the squares (y- yb)2. The sum of these squares is a minimum. This can be checked by assigning other values for h (using any two points) and allowing the graph to pivot around (xm, ym). The regression coefficient r2 = 1 - { (y- yb)2 / (y- ym)2 } is a measure of the strength of the correlation between x and y (or y/x versus x). For a perfect correlation, when all points lie exactly on the graph, r2 = +1.000. 24. The Method of Least Squares: The Debt-GDP Relation for the Trillionaire Club of Nations, Published May 4, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/139348541/The-Method-of-Least-SquaresThe-GDP-Debt-Relation-for-the-Trillionaires-Club-of-Nations 25. The Method of Least Squares: Predicting the Batting Average of a Baseball Player (Hamilton in 2013), Published May 7, 2013, http://www.scribd.com/doc/139924317/The-Method-of-Least-SquaresPredicting-the-Batting-Average-of-a-Baseball-Player-Hamilton-in-2013 26. Bibliography, Articles on Extension of Plancks Ideas and Einsteins Ideas beyond physics, Compiled on April 16, 2013,
Page | 32

27.

28.

29. 30.

31.

32.

33.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/136492067/Bibliography-Articles-on-theExtension-of-Planck-s-Ideas-and-Einstein-s-Ideas-on-Energy-Quantum-totopics-Outside-Physics-by-V-Laxmanan Money in Economics is Just like Energy in Physics: Extending Plancks Law Beyond Physics, Published Jan 14, 2013, Introduction to the generalized statement of Plancks radiation law and application to describe the maximum point on the profits-revenues graph of a company (the old, GM, Ford, Yahoo), http://www.scribd.com/doc/120324960/Money-inEconomics-is-Just-like-Energy-in-Physics-Extending-Planck-s-law-beyondPhysics Plancks Blackbody Radiation law rederived for more general case, May 30, 2012, http://www.scribd.com/doc/95329905/Planck-sBlackbody-Radiation-Law-Rederived-for-more-General-Case What is Entropy? June 3, 2012, Discussion of example given by Boltzmann in 1877 http://www.scribd.com/doc/95728457/What-is-Entropy On Cathode Rays, Nobel Lecture, May 28, 1906, by Philip Lenard, http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1905/lenardlecture.pdf On the Dual Nature of Light As Reflected in the Nobel Archives, by G. Ekspong, Member of the Nobel Committee for Physics, 1975-1988 and its Chairman for two years, First Published Dec 2, 1999 http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/articles/ekspong/ Einsteins Photoelectric Equation and Contact Electromotive Force, by R. A. Millikan (click here), Phys. Rev., Vol. VII, No. 1 (1916), Second Series, pp. 18-32. In this first paper, published in 1916, Millikan provides only two data points (V0 and f values) for the experiments with lithium metal. A Direct Photoelectric determination of the Plancks h, by Robert A Millikan, (click here) Phys. Rev. Vol. VII No. 3 (1916), Second Series, pp. 355-390 http://mapageweb.umontreal.ca/leonelli/PHY3320/millikan.pdf More detailed experiments with lithium (5 data points) and sodium (6 data points) are presented in this second paper, also published in 1916. In the introduction, Millikan provides a new summary of Lenards findings and Einsteins explanation via the photoelectric equation.

Page | 33

34. The electron and light quant from experimental point of view, May 23, 1924, Nobel Lecture, by Robert Millikan, see Figure 4 on page 63, for experiments with sodium. The straight line graph for photoelectric experiments confirms Einsteins law. The slope of the graph gives the universal Planck constant h, one of the fundamental constants of nature. http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1923/millika n-lecture.pdf 35. On a heuristic point of view about the creation and conversion of light, by A. Einstein, 1905, Einsteins original paper which showed light can be viewed as particles with fixed energy quanta,
http://www.ffn.ub.es/luisnavarro/nuevo_maletin/Einstein_1905_heuristic.pdf

36. On a heuristic point of view concerning the production and transformation of light, Paper 5, in Einsteins Miraculous Year: Five Papers that changed the face of physics, Princeton Univ. Press (1998). http://press.princeton.edu/einstein/materials/light_quanta.pdf 37. Einsteins Quanta, Entropy, and the Photoelectric Effect, by Dwight E. Neuenschwander, Excellent discussion about how Einstein arrives at his conception of light quanta from the property called entropy possessed by radiation in the form light,
http://www.sigmapisigma.org/radiations/2004/elegant_connections_f04.pdf

38. Max Planck: The Quantum Hypothesis, in Great Experiments in Physics,

Edited by Morris H. Shamos, Dover Publications (1959), pp. 301-314. English translation of the original paper by Max Planck with brief explanatory notes by Shamos.

Great Experiment in Physics: Firsthand Accounts from Galileo to ... - Page 367
books.google.com/books?isbn=0486253465 Morris H. Shamos - 1959 - Preview - More editions

Firsthand Accounts from Galileo to Einstein Morris H. Shamos ... See quantum hypothesis; Planck, Max radiation, Maxwell's principle of, 185; density of, 306, 307; nature of, 216-217; rectilinear propagation of, 216 radioactivity, and atomic ... http://books.google.com/books?id=NwkXXyXmQdcC&pg=PA367&dq=plan ck+shamos+quantum+hypothesis&hl=en&sa=X&ei=2HVcUbfTGaPage | 34

C0QGl9YCQBg&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=planck%20shamos% 20quantum%20hypothesis&f=false (The original text of Plancks December 1900 paper may be found by clicking on 329 under Planck, when the link given here opens.) 39. A Brief biography of Max Planck, http://cosweb1.fau.edu/~jordanrg/bios/Planck/Planck_bio.htm 40. Max Planck: The Reluctant Revolutionary, by Helge Kragh, Physics World, December 2000, pp. 31-35, http://www.math.lsa.umich.edu/~krasny/math156_article_planck.pdf 41. Planck, the Quantum and Historians, Phys. In Perspective, 4 (2002), pp. 170-215. by Clayton A. Gearhart, http://employees.csbsju.edu/cgearhart/pubs/PQH.pdf see discussion of Boltzmanns definition of entropy starting page 181, equations 5 and 6 on page 182, the expressions given here and Boltzmanns example of now entropy arises. Also, see equation 7 on page 186 for total number of complexions, equations 8 and 9 on page 188 and page 202. 42. One Hundred Years of Quantum Physics, by Daniel Kleppner and Roman Jackiw, http://www.4physics.com/phy_demo/QM_Article/article.html 43. Theoretical concepts in physics, by M. S. Longair, Cambridge University Press (1984). http://www.amazon.com/Theoretical-Concepts-PhysicsAlternative-Reasoning/dp/052152878X Chapters 9 to 15 (case studies IV and V) and also chapters under Case Study II (Maxwell equations and electromagnetism) are highly recommended and cover the Planck and Einstein laws which are actually founded upon Maxwells work. 44. The Photoelectric Effect, by M. Brandl, Project PhysNet, http://www.ifsc.usp.br/~lavfis/BancoApostilasImagens/ApEfFotoeletrico /The%20Photoelectric%20Effect%20-%20m213.pdf See sketch on page 5 showing parallel lines (K-f graph) for sodium and potassium. 45. Focus: Centennial Focus, Millikans Measurement of the Planck constant, Phys. Rev. Focus 3, 23 (1999), April 22, 1999, by Gerald Holton, http://physics.aps.org/story/v3/st23 46. The Millikan experiment to verify the Photoelectric relationship, http://tap.iop.org/atoms/quantum/502/file_47016.pdf
Page | 35

47. Photoelectric Effect, http://physics.tutorvista.com/modernphysics/photoelectric-effect.html 48. The Hypothesis of Light Quanta and the Photoelectric Effect,
http://www.kutl.kyushu-u.ac.jp/seminar/MicroWorld1_E/Part3_E/P36_E/photo_electron_E.htm

The schematic diagrams in Appendix 1 are copied from Ref. [49]. 49. Einsteins God, in On Being, with Krista Tippett, scroll down to Eddingtons experiment for the quote. click here, see Eddington experiment http://www.onbeing.org/program/einstein039sgod/particulars/1930

Page | 36

About the author V. Laxmanan, Sc. D.

The author obtained his Bachelors degree (B. E.) in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Poona and his Masters degree (M. E.), also in Mechanical Engineering, from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, followed by a Masters (S. M.) and Doctoral (Sc. D.) degrees in Materials Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA. He then spent his entire professional career at leading US research institutions (MIT, Allied Chemical Corporate R & D, now part of Honeywell, NASA, Case Western Reserve University (CWRU), and General Motors Research and Development Center in Warren, MI). He holds four patents in materials processing, has co-authored two books and published several scientific papers in leading peer-reviewed international journals. His expertise includes developing simple mathematical models to explain the behavior of complex systems. While at NASA and CWRU, he was responsible for developing material processing experiments to be performed aboard the space shuttle and developed a simple mathematical model to explain the growth Christmas-tree, or snowflake, like structures (called dendrites) widely observed in many types of liquid-to-solid phase transformations (e.g., freezing of all commercial metals and alloys, freezing of water, and, yes, production of snowflakes!). This led to a simple model to explain the growth of dendritic structures in both the groundbased experiments and in the space shuttle experiments. More recently, he has been interested in the analysis of the large volumes of data from financial and economic systems and has developed what may be called the Quantum Business Model (QBM). This extends (to financial and economic systems) the mathematical arguments used by Max Planck to develop quantum physics using the analogy Energy = Money, i.e., energy in physics is like money in economics. Einstein applied Plancks ideas to describe the photoelectric effect (by treating light as being composed of particles called photons, each with the fixed quantum of energy conceived by Planck). The mathematical law deduced by Planck, referred to here as the generalized power-exponential law, might
Page | 37

actually have many applications far beyond blackbody radiation studies where it was first conceived. Einsteins photoelectric law is a simple linear law and was deduced from Plancks non-linear law for describing blackbody radiation. It appears that financial and economic systems can be modeled using a similar approach. Finance, business, economics and management sciences now essentially seem to operate like astronomy and physics before the advent of Kepler and Newton. Finally, during my professional career, I also twice had the opportunity and great honor to make presentations to two Nobel laureates: first at NASA to Prof. Robert Schrieffer (1972 Physics Nobel Prize), who was the Chairman of the Schrieffer Committee appointed to review NASAs space flight experiments (following the loss of the space shuttle Challenger on January 28, 1986) and second at GM Research Labs to Prof. Robert Solow (1987 Nobel Prize in economics), who was Chairman of Corporate Research Review Committee, appointed by GM corporate management.

Cover page of AirTran 2000 Annual Report

Can you see that plane flying above the tall tree tops that make a nearly perfect circle? It requires a great deal of imagination to see and to photograph it.

Page | 38