Hello

Quant Camp

Juan Tellez

jftellez@ucdavis.edu

UC Davis

September 25, 2024

Plan for today

What’s this class about?
Getting to know each other
Voting patterns in the United Nations

What’s this class about?

Most wanted lists

Countries like the US spend lots of resources trying to kill, capture leaders of non-state armed groups
- Rebel groups, terrorist orgs, organized crime
This is known in the literature as decapitation
- “to cut off the head”

Does decapitation work?

The data: Milton and Price (2020)

Name	Year	Decapitated?	Collapsed?
April 19 Movement (M-19)	1987	No	No
April 19 Movement (M-19)	1988	No	No
Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF)	1996	No	No
Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF)	1997	Yes	No
al-Qaeda	1988	No	No
al-Qaeda	1989	No	No

The results: a big effect!

Decapitated terrorist groups are 3 times more likely to collapse

Does this mean decapitation causes terrorist orgs to break down?

Not so fast…

Groups that are decapitated are different from groups that aren’t decapitated

Groups that were decapitated
Harakat ul-Mujahidin (HuM)
Irish National Liberation Army (INLA)
Manuel Rodriguez Patriotic Front (FPMR)
Self-Defense Groups of Cordoba and Uraba (ACCU)

Groups that weren't decapitated
Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF)
Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF)
National Socialist Council of Nagaland-Isak-Muivah (NSCN-IM)
Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan

The groups that are decapitated might be the weakest ones, the ones that states especially want to destroy, ones where leaders are more important, etc.

We need to adjust for these differences

What is this class about?

Wrangling and visualizing data to explore the questions we care about

Using models to describe how one political variable might cause another

Thinking causally about the relationships we observe

Grappling with uncertainty in the relationships we observe

An emphasis on doing

No readings
regular, sustained practice with hands-on problem sets
10 weeks of focused study in R, a powerful and in-demand programming language

Class philosophy:

Little to none of this:

\[\sigma^2 = \frac{\sum_{i=1}^{n}(x_i - \mu)^2} {n}\]

Lots of this:

prison |> 
  # look at california
  filter(state == "California") |> 
  # measure variation over time
  summarise(prison_sd = sd(incarcerated_total, na.rm = TRUE))

This class is practical

This class could be a couple lines on a resume:

Ability to work with data ➡️ marketable
R is popular in industry
Familiarity with R ➡️ other languages
Principles learned in R can be applied elsewhere (Excel)
Problem-solving in Slack

Let’s look at the website

There’s a lot of work (and coding) in this class

I warned you!
Anyone can do it, yes “even” you
you will be surprised at what you can do by the end
But you have to try your best
If this doesn’t work for you, take another class

Inspiration

It’s easy when you start out programming to get really frustrated and think, “Oh it’s me, I’m really stupid,” or, “I’m not made out to program.” But, that is absolutely not the case. Everyone gets frustrated. I still get frustrated occasionally when writing R code. It’s just a natural part of programming. So, it happens to everyone and gets less and less over time. Don’t blame yourself. Just take a break, do something fun, and then come back and try again later.

Hadley Wickham, Chief Data Scientist at RStudio

🚨🚨 Problem sets = 50% 🚨🚨

For the love of all that is good

Do the weekly check-ins; they are free points

Go to section, ask for help on Slack

Do not miss homeworks in this class

Missing one = leaving a big chunk of your final exam blank

I want students who are working hard to do well, but I can’t save you 🎶

Try your best and have fun

Who am I ?

Grew up in Cali, Colombia…

…and Ft. Lauderdale

Went to UF (go gata)…

North Carolina

PhD at Duke University in Durham, NC…

I specialize in political violence, development, and Latin America

South Carolina

…The baby

~~Due: 10/4 (any day now)~~

~~1st Birthday on 10/6~~

2nd Birthday on 10/6

The TAs

👨‍🎓 Haley Darstaad

👩‍🎓 Alexa Federice

👨‍🎓 Richard Kornrumpf

👩‍🎓 Amanda Loehrke

Who are you ?

What year are you?

Where are you from?

aptos, california

elk grove, california

(fairfield, california)

Sacramento

elk grove, california

Porterville, California

Downey,Ca

santa bárbara, california

New Delhi, India

boston, massachusetts

moorpark, california

Los Angeles

Sacramento, CA

San Jose

sacramento, california

Los Gatos, California

san mateo, california

pinole, ca

San Jose, California.

Santa Rosa, California

san luis obispo ca

Shangrao,China

Tulare County

stockton, CA

imperial, california

san jose, california

san mateo, california

China

Portland, Oregon

vallejo, California

Everyone’s in the same boat

Lots of cool stuff

Something cool about you?
i know portuguese
I am learning to speak nahuatl.
I’m the first of my family to go to a 4-year university.
I work hard
I know nothing about coding
Homeowner at the age of 25
I did research on the synthesis of histone deacetylases inhbitors for cancer treatment this summer
I once read a 700 page book in 4 days.
I like basketball a lot.
I have the same initials as FDR.
I’m a classically trained cellist.
I broke my leg because my brother pushed me down the stairs with a nerf gun.
I ran a politics club in high school where we gave people free soup for participating
I’m a second degree black belt and was an instructor at my dojo for four years.
I can recite the alphabet backwards from memory!
I have a black belt in karate
I used to upcycle thrifted clothing
I have been in choir since high school because I like to sing.
I’ve been to every asian country
I have Spanish roots in my family tree
i can juggle
I can wiggle my ears on their own
All my clothes are thrifted.
I know every line of The Muppets movie (2011).
I love to sport climb outdoors
I like to paint.
I was born on Valentine’s Day and love rock!
I am an avid reader
I enjoy collecting house plants as a hobby.
I have to retake this class