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Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

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Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#411

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Taiwan as a piece of land has much more strategic importance than Ukraine. Ukraine's grain and terrain are the two things that are important about it from a utilitarian sense.

Ukraine as a piece of land was Russia's only warmwater port.

> Ukraine as a piece of land was Russia's only warmwater port.

Why is this obviously incorrect statement that can be easily disproved by just checking the map is being repeated again and again on HN? It is only second in popularity to "Russia invaded Ukraine to prevent NATO on its borders" which can also be trivially disproved by finding Estonia or Latvia on the map...

Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#412

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Quoted post unavailable.

"Rational" has somehow become synonymous with "good" or "agrees with me" - rationality doesn't have anything to do with those, it just means "not insane". And tyrants can be exceedingly rational; they just have their own goals that they're working towards, not the goals of some theoretical "perfect democracy".

It's insane to farm people for organs and to run concentration camps.

Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#413

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Exactly. Tbh its constantly surprising why Americans view the CCPs zero-covid policy as a failure. Even the most pessimistic reports (based on actual facts, not tabloid-driven wishful thinking) acknowledges that China has avoided at least 2 million+ deaths through their zero covid policy. Is the right to life no longer a human right? Or have a lot of us so internalized anti-China propaganda that we're no longer able…

> Is the right to life no longer a human right? Ah yes, China, comes to the top of the list when I think of protectors of human life. One-child policies, welding people into their apartment buildings, corralling them into COSTCOs [1] like they're farm animals being loaded into a semi-truck. Such benevolence. > Or have a lot of us so internalized anti-China propaganda that we're no longer able to think logically? Nah,…

So between a country that implements extremely restrictive (some would say 'heartlessly' restrictive) policies in order to safeguard the lives of their vulnerable elderly population, and another country (the 'land of the free') which is so 'free' it allows 1 million+ of its citizens to die, and whose politicians have shown on multiple occasions that they care more about saving the country's economy than saving the lives of their citizens? Which would you say is a 'protector of Human life' as opposed to a 'protector of the economy'.

I would tell you to stop drinking the kool-aid, but it would be a waste of effort. Rational arguments won't work against emotion-driven beliefs and delusions (China - Those Evil Communists. 'West' - Lands of the Free and Birthplace of Freedom and All that is Good).

Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#414

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In terms of human existence tech is overwhelmingly above the average person need. It's not providing anything beside more addictive paths. You don't need more resolution, more bandwidth, more anything.. you probably need less, or more space to reflect and live outside the networked digital realm. ps: to add a bit more, from the few chats I have, people are either saying "well I need that to check my bank account or p…

> In terms of human existence tech is overwhelmingly above the average person need. People have been saying this about technology for as long as technology has existed.

Fair point but there are a few factors: that tool is having a lot of side effects, it went from a mysterious side piece of your life to a central addictive plane. I can't think of any tech that backfired that much. Your computer is underutilized, and its capacity is often above its users intellectually. We never had tools of that kind before, and I'm not sure people will feel the need for more. I personally am completely off the market.

Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#415

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International law is not a good example here because actually if you look at international law then Taiwan is part of China and formally it's considered as part of China by US, EU etc. Taiwan is not a state from perspective of international law so from this perspective it doesn't have sovereign airspace.

I thought China snubbed their noses at International rulings regarding the South China Sea? Now they get respect from same authorities? Can't have it both ways. Join world system or reject it. https://www.cfr.org/councilofcouncils/global-memos/hague-tri...

>snubbed their noses

The PCA "rulings" aren't international law because UN (which PRC accept as international system) has no formal position on them / has not adopted any parts of the decision. Ergo, PRC's SCS position is consistent with international law - like the actual one at UN, not make believe US "rules based order" which was behind PCA lawfare campaign and the ongoing propaganda.

PRC is more firmly within bounds of the "world system", versus US who tries to enforce FONAPs despite not ratifying UNCLOS, and doesn't respect the kind of international law that it accused PRC of violating, see ITLOS ruling (an actual UN ruling) regarding UK/US military base on Chagos/Mauritius/Diego Garcia.

Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#416
post #408
post #188

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How does it do little to diversify these fabs? The current situation is that if China invades Taiwan, the entire Western world is compelled to engage militarily over Taiwan's high end chip fabs. It cannot be overstated how much we depend on that, if TSMC operates in other countries, we don't HAVE to engage in WW3.

No just no Our dedication to protect our ally Taiwan has nothing to do with Silicone and neither does China's nationalist obsession over it. If it comes to war, chips will play no role

What does our dedication have to do with if not that?

Why are you so quick to dismiss being protective of such an important resource as a motivation to protect Taiwan?

Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#417
post #93

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"EU was caught off guard by Russia" You've got to be kidding me. Putin had been warning West since the Munich speech in 2007. [0] [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Munich_speech_of_Vladim...

Yes, the warning signs were there, but the EU was merrily speeding past them, finding reasons to argue against all of the warning signs. NS2 is one of the most emblematic signs of this: it was clearly going to tie Germany's energy needs closer to an already-proven-unreliable partner (Russia), increase the ability of Russia to use gas transit as politics, countries like Poland and the US were screaming at the top of t…

"already-proven-unreliable"

How so?

Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#418
post #297

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If Taiwan is taken off the board for semiconductors, or if all semiconductors have to go through China, that means the entire US military (and all western militaries) are dependent on a geopolitical rival. To allow that would be nothing short of giving away the game.

There are advanced Fabs in Israel, Intel and TSMC are both building next gen Fabs in Arizona. It's not like Twain is the only place with advanced chip fabs(though yes the vast majority of the capacity is there and IIRC thats where their latest process nodes are but I don't think the military is dependent on those absolute cutting edge process nodes)

Taiwan is also the center of a lot of specialist equipment (not the big swiss-watch ASML machines, but stuff like wafer transports, cleanroom gear, etc.) and consumables (chemicals, bunny suits, etc.). I don't know how extensive and fragile that ecosystem is but I live in eastern Michigan and it seems like every small to midsize town has some tiny automotive supplier that is somehow still in business even while the big plants have moved on. I suspect this is largely because they have no competitors and it is specialist work that doesn't really scale (meaning there is only so much of this work to go around, even if global auto sales 10x) so no one is really motivated to compete either. The result is that the GM and Ford plants leave the country, but still rely on a relatively small set of expertise and tooling that only exist in the rust belt. Presumably, a thorough nuking of the Midwest would (in addition to lots of other unpleasant effects, like the death and famine millions, perhaps billions) at least require the pause of the majority of auto manufacturing around the globe. Assuming people still wanted cars after such an event, it could be recovered, but it would take time.

I got a little carried away with the Michigan analogy, but IMO it doesn't go far enough: Taiwan is far more integral to the global semiconductor industry than Detroit is to the global auto industry.

Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#419
post #399

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I wish I could remember the origin of this. But a quip on this idea I had read was along the lines of "If China invaded Taiwan and Kansas, the US would send troops to Taiwan first". Whether you want to call Taiwan an ally, a protectorate, vassal or whatever your political standpoint would dictate, the US is very protective of Taiwan.

Yes but not because of the chips

Because of what, then?

Re: Intel and the $1.5T chip industry meltdown

#420

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If China attempts an invasion on Taiwan it is not unrealistic to suggest they’ll also take a swing at Japan and at least try to destroy the fabs there.

Why? If China decides to invade Taiwan surely they'll do everything they can to not give the rest of the world a reason to intervene. They want Taiwan not a war with the entire west all at once.

The United States has indicated that they would intervene, which means the only way to have a chance at a successful amphibious landing would be to conduct preemptive strikes against US bases in the region. To do so would be a direct declaration of war against the US and NATO, which, at current, China cannot hope to win.

I think China is out of there mind here. They either are A. willing to smash Taiwan to rubble and call it a victory or B. completely overestimate their chance of success.

I think China's real hope is that they can threaten their way to an advantageous position and take Taiwan without firing a bullet, but so far no one is blinking and the west is fed up with autocrats threatening warfare to get their way.

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