News on China's scientific and technological development.

Tyler said:

How come Korea manages to rank so high, with half the population of Guangdong province?

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Because like more than 95% of Korea goes to college and many get channeled to industrial majors like robotics.

Quality is another issue though. Some say that too many dumb people are forced into college and can't find good jobs at the end of the tunnel.

Not all robotics patents are equal.

This is not a knock on Korea. A united Korea can truly challenge Japan.

South Korea is an absolute beast in tech for their size. A united Korea properly set off and organised would easily be many times Japan overall... as has been the case throughout most of East Asia's history.

South Korea only shows China that it is still underperforming! China properly organised and completing development would allow it to be roughly 3 USAs at USA peak.

At the moment, Chinese on average consume and emit roughly 1/3 the average American in terms of energy, overall resources and contribution in emissions. If we want to use a parallel in energy density converted to be analogies for productivity in an individual, on average the Chinese person is roughly still only 1/3 a Korean or Japanese or American. There is much room to develop still and much more progress to be made and gained. Nominally, due to China's huge population this is already enough to make it such a power today but China has nowhere near finished developing. The education for under 40yo today is a remnant of the 1980s and 1990s. It is decent but nowhere near as good as the education in China after 2000s. In about 20 to 30 years time we'll see even greater progress in China as it goes towards completing development and the generational demographics make all this much more obvious.

I mean it's not like 70 year old Chinese people today can be considered for going back to complete high school or whatever they missed. South Korea has completed their journey. They have social problems like everyone else and economic ones too but they ought to be considered a developed nation. Their car industry workers get paid more than American ones (and they're also more competitive).

Once the average Chinese person is as educated and productive, we will see Chinese per capita emissions be a little higher than developed East Asian nations and probably around per capita emissions from Americans and Australians and so on (current highest per capita polluters). This is a decent measure but you gotta account for the industrial set up e.g. Chinese have a lot of heavy industry that manufactures for the world and if these move to places like Vietnam, Bangladesh, Thailand etc even in smaller fractions of total, you'll see China's emissions drop while those countries go through the roof.

Per capita GDP is also quite revealing and although China's is less than 1/3 US, it doesn't account for severely undervalued RMB and intensely overvalued American FIRE sectors and numbers moving on a screen "income". In truth, both emission and income indicators are roughly commensurate with overall development. Basically China can get three times "better" and more "powerful" just to be as productive overall as the average Japanese or South Korean. This is quite achievable since throughout history it has been the case. Not only that, I'd say pockets of China should surpass Japan and SK's performance while other pockets remain at parity.

ougoah said:

South Korea is an absolute beast in tech for their size. A united Korea properly set off and organised would easily be many times Japan overall... as has been the case throughout most of East Asia's history.

South Korea only shows China that it is still underperforming! China properly organised and completing development would allow it to be roughly 3 USAs at USA peak.

At the moment, Chinese on average consume and emit roughly 1/3 the average American in terms of energy, overall resources and contribution in emissions. If we want to use a parallel in energy density converted to be analogies for productivity in an individual, on average the Chinese person is roughly still only 1/3 a Korean or Japanese or American. There is much room to develop still and much more progress to be made and gained. Nominally, due to China's huge population this is already enough to make it such a power today but China has nowhere near finished developing. The education for under 40yo today is a remnant of the 1980s and 1990s. It is decent but nowhere near as good as the education in China after 2000s. In about 20 to 30 years time we'll see even greater progress in China as it goes towards completing development and the generational demographics make all this much more obvious.

I mean it's not like 70 year old Chinese people today can be considered for going back to complete high school or whatever they missed. South Korea has completed their journey. They have social problems like everyone else and economic ones too but they ought to be considered a developed nation. Their car industry workers get paid more than American ones (and they're also more competitive).

Once the average Chinese person is as educated and productive, we will see Chinese per capita emissions be a little higher than developed East Asian nations and probably around per capita emissions from Americans and Australians and so on (current highest per capita polluters). This is a decent measure but you gotta account for the industrial set up e.g. Chinese have a lot of heavy industry that manufactures for the world and if these move to places like Vietnam, Bangladesh, Thailand etc even in smaller fractions of total, you'll see China's emissions drop while those countries go through the roof.

Per capita GDP is also quite revealing and although China's is less than 1/3 US, it doesn't account for severely undervalued RMB and intensely overvalued American FIRE sectors and numbers moving on a screen "income". In truth, both emission and income indicators are roughly commensurate with overall development. Basically China can get three times "better" and more "powerful" just to be as productive overall as the average Japanese or South Korean. This is quite achievable since throughout history it has been the case. Not only that, I'd say pockets of China should surpass Japan and SK's performance while other pockets remain at parity.

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Emissions might not be that telling, since the per capita emissions of the Chinese population should only rise a bit in this decade, before starting to fall (more green energy and nuclear).

ougoah said:

South Korea is an absolute beast in tech for their size. A united Korea properly set off and organised would easily be many times Japan overall... as has been the case throughout most of East Asia's history.

South Korea only shows China that it is still underperforming! China properly organised and completing development would allow it to be roughly 3 USAs at USA peak.

At the moment, Chinese on average consume and emit roughly 1/3 the average American in terms of energy, overall resources and contribution in emissions. If we want to use a parallel in energy density converted to be analogies for productivity in an individual, on average the Chinese person is roughly still only 1/3 a Korean or Japanese or American. There is much room to develop still and much more progress to be made and gained. Nominally, due to China's huge population this is already enough to make it such a power today but China has nowhere near finished developing. The education for under 40yo today is a remnant of the 1980s and 1990s. It is decent but nowhere near as good as the education in China after 2000s. In about 20 to 30 years time we'll see even greater progress in China as it goes towards completing development and the generational demographics make all this much more obvious.

I mean it's not like 70 year old Chinese people today can be considered for going back to complete high school or whatever they missed. South Korea has completed their journey. They have social problems like everyone else and economic ones too but they ought to be considered a developed nation. Their car industry workers get paid more than American ones (and they're also more competitive).

Once the average Chinese person is as educated and productive, we will see Chinese per capita emissions be a little higher than developed East Asian nations and probably around per capita emissions from Americans and Australians and so on (current highest per capita polluters). This is a decent measure but you gotta account for the industrial set up e.g. Chinese have a lot of heavy industry that manufactures for the world and if these move to places like Vietnam, Bangladesh, Thailand etc even in smaller fractions of total, you'll see China's emissions drop while those countries go through the roof.

Per capita GDP is also quite revealing and although China's is less than 1/3 US, it doesn't account for severely undervalued RMB and intensely overvalued American FIRE sectors and numbers moving on a screen "income". In truth, both emission and income indicators are roughly commensurate with overall development. Basically China can get three times "better" and more "powerful" just to be as productive overall as the average Japanese or South Korean. This is quite achievable since throughout history it has been the case. Not only that, I'd say pockets of China should surpass Japan and SK's performance while other pockets remain at parity.

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Disagree. Japan has historically contributed more to culture than Korea. A united Korea would probably be on parity with Japan, and give Japan a much needed cudgel for the first time in a long while. This is just futurism though

Despite the Lost Decades, Japanese are still pretty complacent about their place. A united Korea would give them a rude awakening and get them back on their creative feet

Michaelsinodef said:

Emissions might not be that telling, since the per capita emissions of the Chinese population should only rise a bit in this decade, before starting to fall (more green energy and nuclear).

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It is far from accurate but it's fair to say there is a certain trend to emissions data once you account for major factors.

It is a useful litmus test just like GDP per capita is also a useful litmus test (it's still a highly inaccurate way to figure these things out).

Point is that there is a pattern to take note of with emissions. Literally all the industrialised and developed nations with the higher standards of living and all associated metrics have high per capita emissions. Single out all the tech dominant ones (USA, Japan, Germany, South Korea, France, Sweden, UK) and they also measure up. These two are obviously hand in hand EXCEPT when it comes to China. China is NOT a developed nation yet with similar comprehensive top tier, non-political, indicator metrics (although mostly up there in 80%+ categories) but China IS absolutely a tech dominating nation even ahead of a few on that list in multiple domains and in multiple ways.

So China is the only current outlier when it comes to tech and industry along with development but this was also the case for Japan and South Korea before they were above those "developed nation" indicator metrics. Russia ain't an industrial or tech slouch at all (despite losing ground post Soviet Union) and isn't anywhere near comprehensively above those metrics either. In many ways even below China.

All this is to say if we consider China's overall results on development indicators and litmus tests like GDP per cap (as inaccurate a picture as that may build) and emissions per capita, it's abundantly clear that China can do a lot better and will since it is developing and progressing and finding new things to improve on. If it were to reach a benchmark peak of Japan/USA overall productivity and efficiency, China would be several times "bigger" than the USA at its peak. 300 million people and 1500 million people at the same individual productivity level.

USA has one major advantage and that is the fact it still attracts a lot of the world's best and brightest and hardest working because it offers some of the most renowned, well funded, experienced, well connected etc industries and great pay. Not to mention better overall living standards than China currently offers. The irony of increased US violence and racism is that fewer East Asian talents are making a life there compared to the past and some established ones are leaving.

China has the advantage of homogeneity and the relative social harmonies that come with homogeneity. Chinese people also have measurably higher IQ and not by insignificant levels either. That does help as we can see in Indonesia and Malaysia migrant and development over the years where higher IQ develop nations and industries and move towards the top of the social pyramid. Then we have examples of South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, and Singapore knocking it out of the park in such short periods of time, recovering from colonialism, war, civil war, being robbed clean and so on. Chinese Indonesians and Malaysians had to deal with real and actual, proven and acknowledged genocide (not CNN genocide) and still within generations, move to the top and are almost the exclusive contributors to tech and industry in those nations.

However, China's homogeneity comes at the cost of diversity of thinking. There is something to be said of the benefits there but the drawbacks almost completely offset those with other inefficiencies and conflicts that arise from identity differences. Especially considering a society that cannot deal with those conflicts well enough.

Crang said:

Despite the Lost Decades, Japanese are still pretty complacent about their place. A united Korea would give them a rude awakening and get them back on their creative feet

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Maybe it's just that METI and MOTEI have very different priorities and competencies. Is it just me or Japan has a very dull startup scene?

South Korea got much greater help for much longer time from Russia and Germany and even today. Just look at designers and engineers from Germany in SK Auto industry. Japan took much independent path for development.
Korea by spreading its limited tech people in too many fields make them more dependent on foreign scientific base and create quality and reliability issue. thats the reason Korea need longer warranties to sell its automobiles vs Japanese car exported from Japan.
see this example.

Xsizor said:

Maybe it's just that METI and MOTEI have very different priorities and competencies. Is it just me or Japan has a very dull startup scene?

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McKinsey ran an Insight saying that finally for the first time Japan's startup scene is becoming energetic in 2021, and the venture capital scene is coalescing. We wait to see

Crang said:

Disagree. Japan has historically contributed more to culture than Korea. A united Korea would probably be on parity with Japan, and give Japan a much needed cudgel for the first time in a long while. This is just futurism though

Despite the Lost Decades, Japanese are still pretty complacent about their place. A united Korea would give them a rude awakening and get them back on their creative feet

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To who's culture? Historically? No way! Korea has at least as much "culture" historically. I would say more but I'm no historian. Just know that when Chinese and Korean diplomats visited Japan and vice versa, both China and Korea were shocked at how "barbaric" the Japanese were.

I would say China contributed far more to Japanese culture historically (self evident and ask any expert) than to Korean culture despite obvious influences flowing around. India and Persia also contributed some to Chinese culture and vice versa, where those central and south Asian cultures flowed to Japan and Korea through China and then morphing into different things altogether.

I'm talking about technology. South Korea is at least an equal of Japan already. Computing, robotics, ship building, electronics, consumer goods, industrial goods and equipment, machinery etc. A united Korea operating at peak (obviously ideal assumptions and immediate arrival at ideal status) would be at least two Japans considering South Korea is still on the up and up and not even peaking.

I would personally (probably unfairly) simplify Japan's issues being a combination of American stifling of Japan's tech and industrial might in the 1980s to 1990s and Japan just being culturally partial to hardware over software and generally less accepting of the new and less ready to adopt and explore the "new". Preferring to get entrenched is exactly what the Americans were like and doubling down on clear errors of judgment. We see Japanese industries doing a bit of that now. It's a symptom of leading and doing well for a long time. It's often the newcomers with nothing to lose so to speak that move things forward. The South Koreans are still much more flexible in their thinking and attitudes than Japanese ones. Then consider how Japan's more conservative attitudes create inefficiencies where those apply eg gender roles to a greater degree than even South Korea and China.

pmc said:

South Korea got much greater help for much longer time from Russia and Germany and even today. Just look at designers and engineers from Germany in SK Auto industry. Japan took much independent path for development.
Korea by spreading its limited tech people in too many fields make them more dependent on foreign scientific base and create quality and reliability issue. thats the reason Korea need longer warranties to sell its automobiles vs Japanese car exported from Japan.
see this example.

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Well then why can't it be said that US got much help since WW2 ended. From Germany to USSR to Europeans to Jews to East Asians and the continued migration and sucking up of intellectual outliers and professionals of every field.

I think all that is a null argument.

If SK auto industry benefited from any foreign talents working within it, we can only conclude that those SK auto industries were damn well managed and understood who to pay and how much to pay. This is how the USA still has tech industries.

Nazi rocket engineers brought NASA to orbit, brought USA to the moon, brought USA into space basically. Should we dismiss NASA and SpaceX tech and experts today because of those foundations?

Does any of that take away from their brilliant own work as well and how they managed themselves and their available resources?