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2025 Letter

danwang.co

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Re: 2025 Letter

#71

Post by nradov »

nullorempty wrote: post #35

>Lack of action due to the expectation of long timelines is one of the sins of the lawyerly society. >But American problems seem more fixable to me than Chinese problems. China has stayed on trajectory of improving life of its society for a long time. USA has been in decline all that time and decent accelerated after Cold War with Russia ended. All of China's growth comes from its internal resource. Growth in the USA…

China has very limited internal natural resources. Much of their growth has been enabled by massive imports of raw materials including soybeans, fertilizer, fossil fuels, iron ore, copper ore, etc. Their prosperity and even their survival is heavily dependent on the post-WWII global free trade system. Ironically, China's expansionist foreign policy is one of several factors now causing that system to fray. In another decade they might find it's not so easy to import soybeans from Brazil and crude oil from Saudi Arabia and ores from Australia.

I share your concerns over effective loss of freedom of expression in western countries. In the USA at least cancel culture seems to be dying out and people no longer feel as obligated to be politically correct or self-censor. But the UK may be permanently lost.

Re: 2025 Letter

#72

Post by yunnpp »

ceuk wrote: post #70

As a Brit, I struggled to get much interesting out of this considering how many times he mentions "Europe" (in that condescendingly general way that only US folks seem to manage). He talks about "European" prospects and his trip to Denmark but then cites London as a representative example? This almost broke my brain it felt so incoherent. Never mind that (despite my personal wishes) we're not even part of the EU (whi…

"Africa"

Re: 2025 Letter

#73

Post by nullorempty »

nradov wrote: post #71
nullorempty wrote: post #35

>Lack of action due to the expectation of long timelines is one of the sins of the lawyerly society. >But American problems seem more fixable to me than Chinese problems. China has stayed on trajectory of improving life of its society for a long time. USA has been in decline all that time and decent accelerated after Cold War with Russia ended. All of China's growth comes from its internal resource. Growth in the USA…

China has very limited internal natural resources. Much of their growth has been enabled by massive imports of raw materials including soybeans, fertilizer, fossil fuels, iron ore, copper ore, etc. Their prosperity and even their survival is heavily dependent on the post-WWII global free trade system. Ironically, China's expansionist foreign policy is one of several factors now causing that system to fray. In another…

They have that which matters the most - people with certain set of beliefs. That's the wealth of China, which they share generously with the West - just look at the Chinese developers and scientists that work in the West.

Re: 2025 Letter

#74

Post by shimman »

bix6 wrote: post #55
dzonga wrote: post #49

London has the house prices of California and the income levels of Mississippi. the UK is seriously broken, I always reflect on the energy generation statistics of the UK per capita while in the US you see automated car washes, in the uk most car washes are Albanians n other immigrants etc

House prices are out of wack anywhere desirable because the local income is irrelevant when non-locals are allowed to scoop up the local supply.

House prices are only "out of wack" in areas with poor social housing programs.

Housing in Vienna is still affordable, only due to their very successful public housing programs. Public housing can be both beautiful and highly affordable if you want it to be, it's not like we don't know how to make good quality homes with lovely public amenities. It's mostly developers that want to skim on everything while selling it at the highest cost possible.

Poor system if this is the outcome: unaffordability.

Re: 2025 Letter

#75

Post by xixixao »

ceuk wrote: post #70

As a Brit, I struggled to get much interesting out of this considering how many times he mentions "Europe" (in that condescendingly general way that only US folks seem to manage). He talks about "European" prospects and his trip to Denmark but then cites London as a representative example? This almost broke my brain it felt so incoherent. Never mind that (despite my personal wishes) we're not even part of the EU (whi…

He’s writing about China and US. Sure, you can call Europe more diverse, but still it makes sense to draw some generalizations, and I don’t think he’s far from the mark (having myself lived in EU, UK and US).

Re: 2025 Letter

#76

Post by siavosh »

I read the whole post. Really revealing - so much analysis but not a single mention of a global system that is reaching a singularity in wealth concentration, and maybe how that might be an important dimension to reflect on. Its like using so many words to deeply analyze the speed differentials in a car race, but not looking up to see that all the drivers are racing towards a brick wall.

Re: 2025 Letter

#77

Post by BrokenCogs »

ceuk wrote: post #70

As a Brit, I struggled to get much interesting out of this considering how many times he mentions "Europe" (in that condescendingly general way that only US folks seem to manage). He talks about "European" prospects and his trip to Denmark but then cites London as a representative example? This almost broke my brain it felt so incoherent. Never mind that (despite my personal wishes) we're not even part of the EU (whi…

It's pretty clear he meant Europe as the continent, which London is a part of.

It's very similar to "Europeans" broadly generalizing the US as one homogenous country, assuming everyone and everything in Chicago is the same as New York or Dallas.

Source: me, a brit, who has lived and worked in UK and US.

Re: 2025 Letter

#78

Post by xixixao »

dzonga wrote: post #49

London has the house prices of California and the income levels of Mississippi. the UK is seriously broken, I always reflect on the energy generation statistics of the UK per capita while in the US you see automated car washes, in the uk most car washes are Albanians n other immigrants etc

There are differences, but this is oversimplified, and market is “mostly” working. You need more money in California, for transportation, for health care. The standard is bigger houses (bigger everything) in Cali. Life might be richer, in some ways more pleasant, in London (it’s not weather though), including shorter flights to many interesting places.

From my experience the ratio of savings was similar, but the ppp of course favored US for absolute numbers.

Re: 2025 Letter

#79

Post by dpark »

nullorempty wrote: post #63
dpark wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> USA has been in decline all that time and decent accelerated after Cold War with Russia ended. Exactly when do you believe this decline started? I have some major concerns about the current trajectory of the USA, but it seems like nonsense to say that the US has been in decline since well before the Cold War ended. > I can't speak freely in Canada I wonder what it is that you want to say but can’t. Comparing China…

> Exactly when do you believe this decline started? with 'perestroyka' in the USSR which predates end of the cold war - ever since they thought they won over communist/socialist ideas and accelerated with the breakup of the USSR >I wonder what it is that you want to say but can’t. Nice try, this won't provoke me. >That’s true. Unelected officials can stay in power and accrue wealth for much longer than elected offici…

> ever since they thought they won over communist/socialist ideas, i.e. with the breakup of the USSR

You seem to have redefined the timeframe significantly. Previously you indicated that the decline was happening even before the end of the Cold War.

I don’t believe that this is a true statement even since the fall of the USSR, though. I’d be interested in what data or metrics this claim of decline is based on.

> Nice try, this won't provoke me.

You’re so unprovoked that you didn’t even address the concern. You could have pointed at what you believed was problematic suppression of free speech (of which there are certainly some examples in western nations) without actually divulging your apparently controversial beliefs.

Bluntly, I believe your criticism here is dishonest. Pearl clutching about apparent suppression of free speech in the west while pointing to a nation that sends ethnic Muslim minorities to reeducation camps as a better system is deeply disingenuous.

> It's a mistake to think that Xi is in power for wealth.

> I often draw a parallel with being a father. You have some power, but mostly you have responsibilities.

This is a man who refused the traditional transfer of power within the CCP and had the Chinese constitution revised so that he could remain in power. This is absolutely a man who wants power and wealth.

You’re plainly biased.

Re: 2025 Letter

#80

Post by kalkin »

I have nonspecific positive associations with Dan Wang's name, so I rolled my eyes a bit but kept going when "If the Bay Area once had an impish side, it has gone the way of most hardware tinkerers and hippie communes" was followed up by "People aren’t reminiscing over some lost golden age..."

But I stopped at this:

> “AI will be either the best or the worst thing ever.” It’s a Pascal’s Wager

That's not what Pascal's wager is! Apocalyptic religion dates back more than two thousand years and Blaise Pascal lived in the 17th century! When Rosa Luxemburg said to expect "socialism or barbarism", she was not doing a Pascal's Wager! Pascal's Wager doesn't just involve infinite stakes, but also infinitesimal probabilities!

The phrase has become a thought-terminating cliche for the sort of person who wants to dismiss any claim that stakes around AI are very high, but has too many intellectual aspirations to just stop with "nothing ever happens." It's no wonder that the author finds it "hard to know what to make of" AI 2027 and says that "why they put that year in their title remains beyond me."

It's one thing to notice the commonalities between some AI doom discourse and apocalyptic religion. It's another to make this into such a thoughtless reflex that you also completely muddle your understanding of the Christian apologetics you're referencing. There's a sort of determined refusal to even grasp the arguments that an AI doomer might make, even while writing an extended meditation on AI, for which I've grown increasingly intolerant. It's 2026. Let's advance the discourse.

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