Slashdot Mirror
China Going Up and Coming Down
SoCalChris writes "The BBC writes that China has just completed the world's highest railroad, climbing to 16,640 feet (5,072 meters) above sea level. The cars will be sealed to help passengers cope with the pressure changes from the altitude. The line is expected to begin carrying passengers next year." This news comes at the same time that their Chinese taikonauts return from their spaceflight after just 115 hours in orbit.
This just seems unsafe to me. Imagine something goes wrong and the train is stuck up at that altitude. Then what?
I remember riding a train that had colided with a truck a few years back. This wouldn't likely happen at that altitude, but what could happen would be wildlife and environmental blockage.
It seems like a challenge to me.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Well that seals the cultural genocide of the Tibetan people.
:wq
Ok, goody for them. Having a third player in space is probably a good thing even if they are the communist Chinese since they probably won't remain communist a lot longer. On the other hand it is just another doomed government 'prestige' program that won't actually acomplish much before being abandoned the second the cost exceeds the publicity value and that always happens long before anything longterm good can happen.
Nope, the only hope of our species getting off this rock is private enterprise.
Democrat delenda est
It also comes at the same time that the number of Chinese people living in extreme poverty rose by 800,000 last year.
While we [the /. crowd] bitch and moan about Microsoft and while the great herd worry more about Britney's spawn than credible science, more about the latest American Idol than engineering and while China and India graduate more scientists and engineers than the US...you can expect many, many more reports like this. The 21st century just may be when the Sino-Communist brand of capitalism eclipses lAmerican power and influence.
Are they talking about funicular trolleys or actual heavy rail? Because heavy rail generally sees a 4% grade as a maximum due to, well, physics. Since I'm not aware of any fantastic engineering innovations, this must be some sort of light rail--or at least lighter than standard heavy rail.
Asparagus has many and excellent powers.
with expanded access to new goods and services, educational opportunities, and contact with the outside world
All of the above could have been accomplished without destroying a millenium of scholastic and artistic works. Not to speak of the execution and incarceration of its living representatives.
Real shame that the standard of living in Tibet has risen steadily from the subsistence level ever since the CCP took control, huh?
For the Chinese immigrants. The native population are treated as second class citizens. Hundreds of thousands died of starvation when collectivism was first introduced, and most survivors suffer from various disabilities caused by malnutrition.
:wq
The images on Xinhua are meant to demonstrate the capsule landing. They're not pretending to be actual photos. You should know better than to trust headlines with a question mark at the end of them.
This type of thing goes on all the time in western media, and there was no attempt to pass off the images as actual photographs. It's just a misconception put forth by xenophobic conspiracy nuts.
The sheer arrogance emitted from some posts are really not worthy of slashdot, and/or its readers/posters.
What China has done, - in terms of the Qinhai-Tibet rail-line, or its spacecraft, - is not better, nor worse, than those from other countries.
Do we see any comments like the
" Some of the images of the spacecraft look fake"
and
"and the ones that don't look fake show damage on the spacecraft"
and
"This just seems unsafe to me. Imagine something goes wrong and the train is stuck up at that altitude?"
and
"Well that seals the cultural genocide of the Tibetan people"
and
"Wow, you are finally almost to the point where the USA's space program was over 40 years ago. That is impressive"
and
"It also comes at the same time that the number of Chinese people living in extreme poverty rose by 800,000 last year"
ad nauseum
if the spacecraft or railway is from the United States of America or Russia ?
This development of sheer arrogance, is not checked, might even venture into the territory of racism.
I'm an /. old-timer, and I'm really sad to see /. goes to the dog because of these type of postings.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
Real shame that the standard of living in Tibet has risen steadily from the subsistence level ever since the CCP took control, huh?
If I could trust a totalitarian government to do anything other than lie, maybe so. As it is they may as well be claiming that Tibetans are made of cheese for all the validity it has.
Anyway the song that "we're doing it all to raise the natives" has been the standard line of the conqueror all through history, and the natives always get the shaft in the end.
Trucks and busses are only cheaper if there is already a highway going where you want. Highways are not free, even though a lot of Americans seem to think they are a natural feature of the landscape.
I am really starting to hate the China apologists on /. Way to go! you mention the railroad but you dont mention WHERE the railroad was made. If you read up on it you see that it was made to link China to TIBET where the local population is being wiped out by the chinese communists. Of course they are going to invest in somthing that provides more places for an over crowded china to move people to.
No, I am not a stoned "free tibet hippie", i happen to come from that part of the world.
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
If there is any payoff to the destruction of US industrial might by moving it to China, their greater space activity is it. They are to be congratulated for a positive application of their growth and I hope they put the US to shame for the failure of its pioneer heritage. But the railroad, for all of its engineering prowess, is just another nail in the coffin of Tibetan self-determination. There are things more important than economic development.
Seastead this.
Wow.
>You've said that it looks like an "aluminium motor home from..."
Do you know if it works ok for the job it was designed for? How do the looks matter here?
>It looks like it can barely support its own weight. Granted, gravity is very weak in orbit, blah blah blah, but doesn't this thing get strapped to the top of a rocket?
Ignorance is bliss. For things you have no clue about, its best to remain silent or do your own research.
>It's got burn marks all over it
>And no apparent heat shielding
You are speculating. You obvisously have heard the word "heat shielding" and thats about what you know about it.
"Its got burn marks all over it" - must be the funniest sentence
I've heard.
I could continue to post all your trash but I guess we aren;t contributing in a meaningful way on this.
They look fake because the little caption on top, in Chinese, says "Simulated Rendering".
The rest of the images, they must have filmed in the same sound stage that faked the Apollo moon landings.
-=- Terence
A friend of mine returned from China and Tibet two years ago and mentioned the train and how many Chinese made no bones about the fact the train would be used to move many Chinese into Tibet to shift the demographics and help dillute/destroy Tibet as an independent culture.
The US rail system is well managed, with one exception: Amtrak. The US railroads have realized that freight does not care too much about how fast it is going, sitting still waiting for another train to pass, and not taking the shortest route point to point.
So the US rails have decided to focus on freight where they hold nearly 2/3rds of all traffic (compare to less than 1/3rd for Europe's rails). That is good management: do what you can do well, and let someone else deal with what you cannot do well. I would argue that Europe's rails are mismanaged, spending all their energy on moving people when it is much easier to move freight.
Anyway the song that "we're doing it all to raise the natives" has been the standard line of the conqueror all through history, and the natives always get the shaft in the end.
Funny, that's exactly what most USians are saying about the invasion of Iraq.
And there you go, that's the two major parts of the joke that is N. American railways. The trains can't even keep to the schedule, to the point that you're expecting it to take 20% longer. And secondly the trains are so bloody slow. Eugene to LA is between 800 and 900 miles, which at 60 mph would take 15 hours. You're talking about them averaging 30 mph!!! Most modern countries have their intercity trains running at over 100 mph. The London to Edinburgh trains in the UK top out at 140, and the London to Paris even more on the French side. The UK doesn't have the fastest rail networks either. Your journey by rail should be taking well under 10 hours. At least you will get to enjoy the view, which is very nice in that area.
Which history books have you been reading? For most of recent history (prior to 1950) Tibet was in effect an independent state. It certainly wasn't considered part of China when Britain invaded Tibet in 1903! Britain then gave it to China because all they wanted was a secure trade route through it. The Tibetans then overthrew the Chinese and by 1906 had regained effective independence. China then descended in to civil war and Europe in to WWI and so everybody lost interest in Tibet until China had become communist and invaded in 1949-50.
Most of China's historical claim to Tibet is based on the fact that from the 1300s Tibet was ruled by Beijing, which is technically true - but it was not ruled by the Chinese! The Mongols (Ghengis Khan, et. al) invaded China, Tibet, Korea and most of the rest of South East Asia and ruled the whole area from Beijing. That hardly gives China a legitamate claim, and it gives them no more of a claim to Tibet than it to Korea.
Since the invasion in 1950 vast numbers of Chinese people have been moved in whilst similarly vast numbers of Tibetans have died of starvation or fled to India, Nepal and Bhutan. The Chinese government has systematically sought to destroy the Tibetan culture, religion, and identity, to the point where Tibetans are now outnumbered by Chinese in their own land. This railroad will only accellerate that process.
They've done a fine job too: Bhopal, US tobacco industry, Pinkertons, South Africa, Love Canal...
It's most ironic that you were researching for a human rights project.
Do read some Upton Sinclair and Dickens. Without other moderating
cultural influences, capitalism have run rough shod over human rights for centuries. The benefit of capitalism is economical, not the promotion of a more humane society.
Historically, corporate interests attempt to use governmental influences to gain benefits for themselves as often as they want to be left alone. Look at trade tariffs, agricultural subsidies, the East India Company (Is that a company or an arm of the government?) !
There has never been pure lassiz faire capitalism and there probably never will be. If it comes to be, it's not obvious that you would want to live there.