In defense of merchanting

Merchanting is the activity of buying items at a low price and selling them higher later. If done properly, the merchanter can make substantial amounts of profit. Given factors such as the non-production of items in the process and an apparent increase in price volatility, this kind of business is often stigmatised.

However, merchanting may serve a useful role in the economy. Such activity can actually help to keep prices more stable and, as a bonus, the merchanter will be rewarded for it.

Elastic supply and demand
Price elasticity is how much the quantity of an item in the market changes with a given change in price. The more elastic the price, the more quantity will change with a given price change. There are two types of elasticity:

Lemon Dungeoneers

In 1970, economist George Akerlof released a journal article about the used car market. In it, he drew the distinction between cherries (good cars) and lemons (faulty cars), and predicted how those selling cherries would be driven out of the market (and conversely how the proportion of lemons would increase).

There is often comment by World of Warcraft players how they would, at times, join a sub-par pickup group (PuG) and resultingly endure an excruciating dungeon run. The 'market' for dungeoneering 'labour' may well degenerate similarly, for the fellow dungeoneers likely do not know how skilled each other is.

The thing about asymmetric information
In the lemon market as described by Akerlof, it is asymmetric information that drives cherries out of the market. In such a market, the buyer does not know much about the quality of the seller's product so as to form a price. In the used car market example, the used car has many parts hidden away from view, so the buyer cannot completely know whether the car is free from defects. As a result, they make a best guess that the car is of 'average' quality and so will be willing to pay an 'average' price.

Doomsday: High Impact

Earth is humanity’s cradle, but by no means can it completely harbour us from harm. Many risks threaten individual lives, but there are some catastrophic enough to wipe out entire species. Is it possible for the prolific human species to face extinction?

Impacts with space debris are truly spectacular events, as the size of the object belies the devastation they can wreak. Not only does an impact event obliterate the the area around it, rock can also be thrown high into the air and particularly large ones can change the very evolution of life.

History
After the birth of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago, its planets saw many planet-sized collisions. Mercury was hit by an object that formed the 1550km Caloris basin. Venus suffered a glancing blow that was enough to make it spin the other way. Mars saw an impact that created a crater the size of half the planet's surface.

Doomsday: Pandemic

Earth is humanity’s cradle, but by no means can it completely harbour us from harm. Many risks threaten individual lives, but there are some catastrophic enough to wipe out entire species. Is it possible for the prolific human species to face extinction?

It is not good to be sick. At this day and age, the practice of medicine ensures that people stand a good chance of survivng all common illnesses. However, some diseases do pop up which no medical literature covers and against which no treatments exist. The burden then falls to the rest of society to contain its spread as a pandemic as scientists work frantically to develop a cure...

History
The Bible describes ten 'plagues' that befell the citizens of Ancient Egypt. Subjecting the Israelites to slavery, the Jewish God was accounted to have exacted His vengeance. The tenth plague, which finally convinced the Pharaoh to release the Israelites, was one which killed all firstborn sons in the kingdom. It is known that it was common practice to feed the firstborn son a double helping of grain, and with the ruin of their crops from the previous hailstorm and locust plagues, they needed to draw from supplies stored underground.

WoW Mathematics: Heavy Breathing

When Valiona breathes fire, she breathes lots of it. Not only does it reach the very edges of the room she is in, it also has a 180° angular spread.

Given that most fires tend to be bad, it is usually prudent to run out of it. There are, of course, a multitude of possible directions to run, which leave the player roasting for different amounts of time. Which path is the quickest?

Summary:

• The quickest path out of Devouring Flames is a straight line perpendicular (at right angles) to the boundary of the cone.
• If Valiona is facing the player, the quickest path out is through Valiona.
• Given a Cartesian coordinate system, the starting position (x₁,y₁) and the equation of the boundary ax + by + c = 0 ,the distance d to run is:

Doomsday: Extreme Weather

Earth is humanity’s cradle, but by no means can it completely harbour us from harm. Many risks threaten individual lives, but there are some catastrophic enough to wipe out entire species. Is it possible for the prolific human species to face extinction?

Earth's climate is a complicated system, one which climatologists are still studying. Like in a car or computer, a minor change in one component can cause more major effects throughout. Although volcanoes can disrupt this delicate machinery, there are other factors which can plunge Earth into an ice age, some of which built in, others brought about by humans.

History
150 000 years ago, Earth orbited a little further from the Sun than normal. It went through a particularly severe ice age, where the human population dropped to as low as 2000 people.

Doomsday: She's Gonna Blow

Earth is humanity’s cradle, but by no means can it completely harbour us from harm. Many risks threaten individual lives, but there are some catastrophic enough to wipe out entire species. Is it possible for the prolific human species to face extinction?

Volcanoes cause much disruption in their own right. However, much larger supervolcanoes do exist, with as many as eleven likely hotspots found around the world. Should one erupt, the surrounding area will certainly be levelled and buried, and the broader world would go through an unseasonal winter.

History
There are countless examples of volcanic eruptions throughout human history, let alone throughout the life of planet Earth. A more famous one occurred in AD 79 when Mt. Vesuvius erupted. Nearby Pompeii and Herculaneum were buried under several metres of pumice, sudden enough to preserve the inhabitants in their original positions.