Germany paying $5.5B for Intel fab

This is interesting to read, I'm curious how this diverges/converges from the observation that:

In the West the words for referring to someone formally are words that used to refer to the nobility exclusively (Mister, Misses in English comes from 'Master, Mistress', Monsieur, Madamme in French, Señor, Señora in Spanish, derive from 'My Lord, My Lady' respectively).

So in the West, the cultural transformation was more than mere equality of political voice, but more, that 'we are all nobles', and (domestic?) political history in the West is the ever expanding circle of this inherent nobleness of all (arguably right down to trends in current American social issues).

'Rights' was something that, in the West, was first contested between the nobility and the King, then in the modern period between the wealthy merchant class and the nobility/royalty. James Madison, one of the American Revolution leaders, writes explicitly about how the masses are incapable of the requirements of absolute democracy. So there's definitely something to it when you point out that 'Democracy' in the West wasn't immediately interested in conferring a voice onto every Tom, Dick, and Harry (we'll just set aside the status of women and slaves)

You might be off about 'latter half of the 20th century' bringing electorialism to bear, rather the late 19th century/early 20th century was when, finally, the proletariat started demanding its rights, e.g. The Mexican Civil War that saw the establishment of collective farming lands, the struggle of labor and unions in America and Europe to secure worker's conditions backed by the threat of socialism (which, from Marx himself, is about endignity [ennoblement] of everyone's time), all of which, funny enough, have been desolving since the 90s (NAFTA eradicatd collective farming in Mexico).

Democracy in the West is more than a mere political configuration, its also the cultural precept (however divergent in interpretation), in stark contrast to what you're describing is the history of this idea in China, where, dare I say, the idea of ennoblement stops at a hard boundary unlike in the West.

P.S. I don't know a Chinese language so it may be that the words for formally addressing someone also share this genealogy of descending from terms formerly meant exclusively for nobility.

I think Germany is using the $5 billion dollars to encourage intel to build there plant in Germany rather than somewhere else, but I think your ideas sound great too. can Germany grow an intel for $5 billion? It seems to me it’s like hiring a contractor. I could learn plumbing but it would be a lot more expensive than hiring someone.

I don’t disagree with you that companies are given so much and have so much. I just wonder if it’s idealistic to think it’s easy to just “create your own intel”. Maybe not it’s not like Intel is without competitors. But just like the Plumber example, even if it’s not about the money, do they want to spend the time on developing a skill that may not be one of their core competencies? It’s not that I don’t get where you’re coming from ideologically, I’m just not sure where you’re coming from practically. But I’m no expert, maybe they should try!

Yes with equal dose before the third dose it's less effective, but why would one compare the two vaccines based on number of dosis to get effective?

Back when there were fewer variants, the Janssen vaccine only required 1 dose; was Janssen "better" than mRNA, and did "mRNA vaccines not work very well"?

Here in the Netherlands, once Omikron arrived, the Dutch CDC advised everyone to get a booster (third dose). Nobody here counts on Pfizer having enough protection with just 2 doses. Why would anyone then compare 2-dose Pfizer with 2-dose Sinovac?

What matters is the eventual efficacy after sufficient boosters. Besides, we already live in a "booster subscription" reality. Here in the Netherlands, the elderly are encouraged to get a booster every 3 or 4 months. In light of all this, I'd say it's very disingenuous to compare based on number of dosis instead of eventual efficacy.

And you say "even [after 3 doses] it's significantly worse than Pfizer". Where in table 2 do you see that?

Severe/fatal disease:

- Three-dose BNT162B2: 99.2 for 60-69 yr, 99.5 for 70-79 yr, 95.7 for >= 80 yr

- Three-dose Coronavac: 98.5 for 60-69 yr, 96.7 for 70-79 yr, 98.6 for >= 80 yr

Mortality:

- Three-dose BNT162B2: 98.9 for 60-69 yr, 96.0 for >= 80 yr

- Three-dose Coronavac: 98.7 for 60-69 yr, 99.2 for >= 80 yr

I'm sorry, these numbers look nearly identical to me? They're all >= 96% for the elderly.

I think you're looking at the "mild/moderate" section. Yes the numbers there are lower for Sinovac. But so what? Protection against severe/fatal disease and mortality is the most important. That it's less effective at mild/moderate disease prevention doesn't make "Chinese vaccine don't work very well".

Heck if we go back in time before there were so many variants, various studies showed Sinovac as having roughly 70% protection against mild/moderate COVID (depending on country; efficacy is context-dependent). That 70% was then branded by western media as "Chinese vaccines are junk, they don't work at all, because our mRNA vaccines provide 90%+ protection against mild disease". And now Pfizer has only 70% protection against mild omikron but it's still represented as "mRNA vaccines are much superior, the Chinese are fscked until they get their hands on mRNA". Yes, what's wrong with that narrative?

For some reason, outside of the context of comparisons with China, everybody agrees that Pfizer works kinda "meh" against omikron; it's merely "good enough to get the job done". But when comparing with China, all sorts of people are suddenly inclined to represent mRNA as the holy grail that can end the pandemic, which the Chinese unfortunately don't have.

How is it a benefit? I somehow doubt that with the supply chains interrupted, the new owners will be anywhere as efficient at their business as their predecessors.

Given the recent news I think that there is no correlation. Russia and the EU are giving each other the finger and no amount of mutual trade changed Russia's long standing attitude of taking all they can get (of course all global powers do that.) Actually, no trade at all between Russia and the EU would have made that area of the world more stable: the EU won't have to scramble to replace energy providers and no sanction could harm Russia. There would still be a war but nothing else.