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When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

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Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#261

Post by jomamaxx »

ittekimasu wrote: post #235
jomamaxx wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"And watch while we are plunged into a recession due to a huge disruption in global supply chains." This is false. China is not the sole or important supplier of most things. Vietname, India etc. are becoming capable of providing labour and supply chain. A 10% tariff would be fair. Besides, something needs to be done to balance trade. Right now China is cheating by claiming they are open, whey they are not. The West…

Vietnam/Thailand are already in the supply chain (where do you think all your cameras/hard disks come from ?). India barely has a manufacturing sector.

Of course. But supply/demand economics means as wages/issues rise in China (i.e. trade war) the rest of Asia, which is rising quickly, picks up the slack.

China has scale, and the right value chains for certain things. But ultimately they are commodities. It's that hard to build simple factories and provide reliable electricity and cheap workers.

Indonesia, India, Malaysia, Vietnam etc. - there's a lot of people there waiting to pick up the slack.

The US does not import a lot of meaningful things from China.

China imports a lot of critical goods from the West, particularly Germany. Also - the trade balance is very lopsided.

A 'trade war' with China would be very painful for China, but the West would hardly skip a beat.

A) Consumer prices would rise a little bit. B) Some plants (smart factories) would open in the US C) Mexico would boon, and so would other areas in Asia.

In the long run, if other places pick up the slack, it would permanently damage China's competitive advantages - whereas Western nations would do just fine, save a few German tool makers.

Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#262

Post by terasoans »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #196
terasoans wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the time that the US was developing, it also had extremely low standards for human rights. But as the US prospered, the Civil Rights movement kicked in. So perhaps the same will happen in China.

That isn't true at all. The US had extremely high standards for human rights, just much lower standards for slaves, but the framework and standards already existed for post civil war and the civil rights movement. As far as human rights go, China is somewhere before the Magna Carta in western civilization.

Actually this isn't true at all then. By your logic, China also have an extremely high standard for human rights. Just a cursory look at the Chinese constitution shows how much they value equality.

And surely, the rich and connected people in China have those rights. They are treated fairly by the system and society.

It's just those poorer people that are hurt, but hey, the framework for it still exists.

Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#263

Post by seanmcdirmid »

terasoans wrote: post #262
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That isn't true at all. The US had extremely high standards for human rights, just much lower standards for slaves, but the framework and standards already existed for post civil war and the civil rights movement. As far as human rights go, China is somewhere before the Magna Carta in western civilization.

Actually this isn't true at all then. By your logic, China also have an extremely high standard for human rights. Just a cursory look at the Chinese constitution shows how much they value equality. And surely, the rich and connected people in China have those rights. They are treated fairly by the system and society. It's just those poorer people that are hurt, but hey, the framework for it still exists.

China's constitution is all about equality, free speech, etc...but China's system is not based on constitutional law so they just ignore it. You know that.

People all have the same standards enshrined in the political system, but it is a low bar, and everyone makes out in the economic system instead. It's basically what a libertarian society would look like if they kept the government to a minimum (sans the occasional persecution of a dissident).

Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#264

Post by MarkMc »

vinceguidry wrote: post #247
MarkMc wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't be so sure. China's GDP per capita is currently about 14% of the United States [1]. That's roughly the same ratio that Japan faced in 1960, yet within 30 years Japan overtook the US in GDP per capita [2]. My view is that China has a number of economic and demographic disadvantages that mean in 30 years China is 'only' likely to reach 30-50% of US GDP per capita. But with a population projected to be 3 time…

First, the post I responded to did not claim that our militaries could reach parity. It claimed that China could conquer the US. That's impossible, preposterous even, and the only thing that could change that is the singularity, and if that happens all bets are off. Second, even reaching parity is an immensely daunting proposition. If China were to start building ships and aircraft, the US would respond in kind. Righ…

> First, the post I responded to did not claim that our militaries could reach parity. It claimed that China could conquer the US.

For China to some day have the ability to conquer the US, wouldn't they first have to reach parity? Seems to me the post was implicitly claiming that the China's military could reach parity with the United States. But I agree that the focus of the argument is on exceeding the US military power.

The generals of the First World War had training and experience, but technological change meant that training was useless and they had to re-learn how to fight on the battlefield. Future technology will have the same effect - for example, a swarm of drones might be more capable than a manned fighter aircraft. Air superiority might come down to who can write the better drone software, or perhaps simply who has the most drones. The old investment in manned fighter aircraft would count for nothing.

I agree that the US alliances with other countries is a benefit that China will not have. But China has its own unique benefit - its manufacturing industry. It already far exceeds the US in ability to mass produce smartphones. Couldn't it one day churn out military robots at a far greater rate than the US and Germany combined?

The Soviets never came close to achieving economic parity with the United States. A better analogy would be Britain in the 19th century - it lost its military dominance as the US grew its economy to be much larger than the British economy. In the 21st century China will do to the US what the US did to Britain the 19th century.

My logic is simple: (a) in 30 years China's economy will be bigger than the US economy; (b) in 60 years China's economy will be double the US economy; (c) A country will lose its military superiority to another country if that other country can afford to spend twice as much on its military.

None of these three statements seems particularly controversial to me.

Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#265

Post by skynetv2 »

klodolph wrote: post #36
skynetv2 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> China ended up with last generate tech we are way past that point. China has leap frogged pretty much everyone else in every aspect. It took China less than a year to build the worlds fastest supercomputer (unclassified) after US placed restrictions on related technology exports to China. China was building components for supercomputers over the past decade, they would show case a network, a small processor, coolin…

You're looking at the PR, look at the actual technology. Anyone can build a big enough supercomputer if you throw enough money at the problem. This high level of spending is getting hard to justify, however, because most of the problems you want to solve can't be solved just by throwing another order of magnitude of computing power at the problem. Building a supercomputer becomes a bit of a boondoggle, a public-relat…

> Anyone can build a big enough supercomputer if you throw enough money at the problem

That statement shows you have no idea what's involved in developing one.

Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#266

Post by skynetv2 »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #203
klodolph wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're looking at the PR, look at the actual technology. Anyone can build a big enough supercomputer if you throw enough money at the problem. This high level of spending is getting hard to justify, however, because most of the problems you want to solve can't be solved just by throwing another order of magnitude of computing power at the problem. Building a supercomputer becomes a bit of a boondoggle, a public-relat…

This. China built that supercomputer as a pure PR/face move. It isn't very interesting otherwise, and the west stopped building those kinds of things a long time ago because it moved on to more detached distributed computing.

You need to look deeper into the latest system. It's not a pr machine. Even the pervious one tianhe-2 isn't. If you think it is, you're looking at the wrong sources.

And no, we have not moved away from supercomputers or building bigger ones.

Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#267

Post by vinceguidry »

MarkMc wrote: post #264
vinceguidry wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First, the post I responded to did not claim that our militaries could reach parity. It claimed that China could conquer the US. That's impossible, preposterous even, and the only thing that could change that is the singularity, and if that happens all bets are off. Second, even reaching parity is an immensely daunting proposition. If China were to start building ships and aircraft, the US would respond in kind. Righ…

> First, the post I responded to did not claim that our militaries could reach parity. It claimed that China could conquer the US. For China to some day have the ability to conquer the US, wouldn't they first have to reach parity? Seems to me the post was implicitly claiming that the China's military could reach parity with the United States. But I agree that the focus of the argument is on exceeding the US military…

> For China to some day have the ability to conquer the US, wouldn't they first have to reach parity?

Sure. But it's not enough.

To conquer a country you have to invade it. To invade it you have to move soldiers to it. A lot of them. China could destroy our entire navy and air force and still not be able to conquer us.

This is the reason we used nuclear weapons against Japan in WW2 rather than try to invade it. We could have, but the amount of resources and blood it would have taken was extreme. An operation of that scale conducted across an ocean has only been successful once, and that's because we had a friendly country to establish a base on. (DDay)

Should the Chinese want to invade us, their only real option would be through Mexico. No amount of conventional military dominance can overcome the sheer impossibility of trying to invade a country by sea. And the US and Canada are too close for them to go that route. Invading Canada would be just as hard as invading the US. They could maybe try overland across Russia, Alaska, and Canada, but that would be just as hard as an amphibious assault.

Should the US see that China was gearing up for such a plan, we'd send our army there to rebuff the attempt, ignoring Mexican sovereignty if we had to.

Without troops on the ground, there is no conquest. They could conceivably beat us in conventional conflict given a serious enough advantage, but they could never actually invade us, so complete neutralization is impossible.

Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#268

Post by dennisgorelik »

MarkMc wrote: post #239
vinceguidry wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If China becomes more powerful they may decide to conquer the US properly. That's utterly hilarious. If there's a world in which that's even remotely possible, we'll all be long, long dead by the time it happens.

I wouldn't be so sure. China's GDP per capita is currently about 14% of the United States [1]. That's roughly the same ratio that Japan faced in 1960, yet within 30 years Japan overtook the US in GDP per capita [2]. My view is that China has a number of economic and demographic disadvantages that mean in 30 years China is 'only' likely to reach 30-50% of US GDP per capita. But with a population projected to be 3 time…

It does not look like Japan ever overtook the US in GDP per capita: https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&...

Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#269

Post by MarkMc »

dennisgorelik wrote: post #268
MarkMc wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't be so sure. China's GDP per capita is currently about 14% of the United States [1]. That's roughly the same ratio that Japan faced in 1960, yet within 30 years Japan overtook the US in GDP per capita [2]. My view is that China has a number of economic and demographic disadvantages that mean in 30 years China is 'only' likely to reach 30-50% of US GDP per capita. But with a population projected to be 3 time…

It does not look like Japan ever overtook the US in GDP per capita: https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&...

Yes they did: https://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=d5bncppjof8f9_&...

But it doesn't really matter whether Japan got to 105% or 95% of US GDP in 1990 - my point that China could get to 30-50% of US GDP in 30 years stands.

Re: When It Comes to China, Google’s Experience Still Says It All

#270

Post by conanbatt »

jomamaxx wrote: post #206
conanbatt wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it a problem if China develops a higher GDP than the US. Its not a problem for the people. It might be a problem to politicians that want to tell a story, but wishing china to do worse economically is truly backwards. If china comes out with better technology than the us, better products and services, cheaper and all that, the whole world gets better. If you dont believe that, then you must for the sake of con…

"Why is it a problem if China develops a higher GDP than the US" That isn't the issue. The issue is protectionist policies and direct interference by the state in all sectors. They can do that if they want, but we need to slap tariffs on their products and ban some Chinese companies from selling in the West.

Why, the US is richer for being able to import Chinese products. The victims of the proteccionist policies are the chinese people, that are forced to consume worse products, or at a higher price, or paid with their taxes.

Its like saying "my neighbor is stabbing himself, we should stab ourselves so they learn!"

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