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Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

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Re: Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

#21

Post by flipbrad »

gaius wrote: post #3

Also Yulia Tymoshenko, rightful heir to the throne of Ukraine, is a cyberneticist. It seems to be a regular trend in former Communist countries, that political leaders have a technical background.

Is this really surprising? Technocracy and the associated belief that you can sit down and design or direct societies seem to be prerequisites for what has passed as most "communist" governments to date, right - so why not expect them to embrace and promote engineers, through higher education and indeed through politics and the civil service?

Re: Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

#22

Post by lionhearted »

lotusleaf1987 wrote: post #16
lionhearted wrote: post #6

But, but, but... they're not democratic! If only they'd put more power in the hands of the common man, they too could enjoy such luminous choices for statesmen as McCain vs. Obama, Bush II vs. Kerry, Bush II vs Gore, Dole vs. Clinton, Bush I vs. Clinton... ...we gotta keep saber rattling that our way is better than theirs. Boo China, boo. Edit: To the downvoter - okay, I'm joking around. But which of these premises d…

Chomsky has a great quote about this: In the U.S. there is basically one party - The Business Party. It has two factions, called Democrats and Republicans, which are somewhat different but carry out variations of the same policies. By and large, I am opposed to those policies, as is most of the population. I'm not against business, but it shouldn't be our singular goal as a society.

You know, I think I get where you're coming from because I felt the same way until I (1) opened up a business, and (2) spent significant time outside the USA.

Honestly, the business/commerce in the USA is one of the best things about it. As for Chomsky - well, he's completely discredited to me after comparing his writings about Southeast Asia to spending significant amounts of time in SE Asia. Also the ex-Communist countries. He's a relic from a dead age, who played for the wrong team, and hasn't woken up from it. I've gone into depth on this before, but long story short - North Korea is much worse than South Korea, Taiwan drastically outperformed pre-Deng Xiaoping China, West Germany is still much more developed than East Germany... and it's really obvious that South Vietnam is much worse because it was conquered by North Vietnam.

Also, the Khmer Rouge genocide started the same year after American forces withdrew - the Khmer Rouge were emboldened by the American withdrawal. Little known fact - the last recognized battle of the Vietnam War was USA vs. Khmer Rouge, the only military engagement between the two parties before South Asia went from "bad" to "much much worse."

Anyway - I know this kind of not an easy to do overnight, but I'd really suggest comparing Chomsky's writings on SE Asia to what happened in SE Asia firsthand if you get the chance. Also, try to engage with a full-time entrepreneur while he's building the early stage of a company. Guaranteed perspective-changer.

Re: Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

#23

Post by Maro »

tokenadult wrote: post #14

About a decade ago, when I was studying the history of mathematics, I noticed that in 1776, the world's greatest mathematician (Leonhard Euler) was in St. Petersburg, Russia, just when many of the world's greatest political scientists were either in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (the signers of the Declaration of Independence) or in various parts of Britain (e.g, Edmund Burke and Adam Smith). To this day, the Russian-sp…

Interesting. Where do you put Germans in all this?

Re: Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

#24

Post by Unseelie »

moomin wrote: post #7
bendmorris wrote: post #2

Not to nitpick, but they're engineers. The previous President, Jiang Zemin, was also an electrical engineer - before that generation, most leaders were educated by their experiences (i.e. the Long March) and not formally schooled. It is interesting that not only are there cultural differences in the ways Chinese and western leaders approach problems, but also there's the "engineering" approach vs. the "legal" or "soc…

The distinction between a scientist and an engineer is important here. In the dark days of modern China, mathematicians and scientists were regarded with as much suspicion as poets and philosophers. Engineering was one of the most intellectual professions you could have without being regarded as the enemy. (As for lawyers: there's not a lot of point in being a legal expert anywhere rule by fiat is common.) The proble…

A lot of that stability approach can be traced back through much of the history of the Han, to the point that I'd argue the engineering background isn't the source of the stabilizing pressure, but rather a facet of the Han culture.

Re: Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

#25

Post by run4yourlives »

While this is no doubt going to be unpopular here on HackerNews, I'm going to posit the following: This is almost as bad as have 8 of 9 people being Creationists.

Better than 90% of a council making decisions for the whole country being of the same persuasion is prone to severe group think. Scientists (or rather, engineers, if you RTFA) aren't immune to this any more than any of us are.

If you look at the best run businesses, they are often composed of people with variable backgrounds - people that approach problems from different perspectives. This has two major benefits: First, it allows you to gain from solutions that come from as many types of thought processes as possible and more importantly, it prevents you from blindly following dogma - if you can't convince somebody that doesn't follow your thought patterns of the viability or necessity of a particular idea, it probably shouldn't be perused.

One child policies that have resulted in a generation of males without females is pretty much exactly the type of policy I'd expect from a group of engineers.

Re: Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

#26

Post by stcredzero »

Oh, we forgot about our head of the class: China. Astonishingly, since 1980 China has not won a single scientific Nobel Prize. Keep in mind, this is a country of 1.3 billion people.

If China is ruled by engineers, then it is ruled by groups that understand the economic implications of the rocket equation and how this can be overcome using existing technology. Moving off-world is going to be the next huge watershed in human history and economic growth, much as the age of exploration and colonization of North America by Europeans was the last one.

Making the leap past Type I on the Kardashev scale won't necessarily involve Nobel Prize winning breakthroughs in science.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale

Instead, it will involve massive brute engineering and the political will to devote the resources to bootstrap it. The Chinese "Civilization State", ruled by engineers, is in a unique position to marshall those resources and be in the vanguard of what will be an economic and historic explosion of development.

http://today.ucla.edu/portal/ut/u-s-needs-to-deepen-its-unde...

I've seen this coming for almost a decade. If trends continue, China will not only be the next dominant power, but Chinese Civilization in the inner solar system will be to the last half of the 21st century what North America was to the 20th.

Re: Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

#27

Post by Unseelie »

potatolicious wrote: post #20
pyre wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's maybe a trade-off? Sure we have bozos for politicians in the US, but in the US government corruption usually doesn't lead to people 'disappearing.' Though we're definitely making great strides in that direction.

You're right, but the trend in the US is towards more repression, while the trend in China is towards less . We are destroying our middle class, they are creating and growing theirs at an incredible rate. The attitude that I get from a lot of Chinese is that they feel the present government is a necessary evil - i.e., in exchange for many political and religious freedoms, they get progress, and an immense improvement…

The Chineese exchange students, that is, the ones who are not nationalized in America, the off the boat people, at my school think rather differently. They consider the government of China, for the most part, simply the nature of china. It isn't a necessary evil, its just the way things are.

Re: Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

#28

Post by Unseelie »

run4yourlives wrote: post #25

While this is no doubt going to be unpopular here on HackerNews, I'm going to posit the following: This is almost as bad as have 8 of 9 people being Creationists. Better than 90% of a council making decisions for the whole country being of the same persuasion is prone to severe group think. Scientists (or rather, engineers, if you RTFA) aren't immune to this any more than any of us are. If you look at the best run bu…

As an aside, I'm slightly more concerned with the generation of Only Children as opposed to the generation of 114 men to 100 girls...just to toss another layer of complexity into the mix.

Re: Eight Out Of China’s Top Nine Government Officials Are Scientists

#30

Post by kentrado »

lionhearted wrote: post #22
lotusleaf1987 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chomsky has a great quote about this: In the U.S. there is basically one party - The Business Party. It has two factions, called Democrats and Republicans, which are somewhat different but carry out variations of the same policies. By and large, I am opposed to those policies, as is most of the population. I'm not against business, but it shouldn't be our singular goal as a society.

You know, I think I get where you're coming from because I felt the same way until I (1) opened up a business, and (2) spent significant time outside the USA. Honestly, the business/commerce in the USA is one of the best things about it. As for Chomsky - well, he's completely discredited to me after comparing his writings about Southeast Asia to spending significant amounts of time in SE Asia. Also the ex-Communist c…

>As for Chomsky - well, he's completely discredited to me after comparing his writings about Southeast Asia to spending significant amounts of time in SE Asia. Also the ex-Communist countries. He's a relic from a dead age.

Ad Hominem circumstantial.

>Guaranteed perspective-changer.

If I was a BP CEO I would have a different perspective on the oil spill, and If I was a Goldman&Sachs CEO I would have a different perspective on the economic crash. Perspectives are not arguments.

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