China Systematically Developing New Technologies

newsblaze writes "China, having recognized there are major gaps in its science and technology arsenal, released their Technology Development Plans. The plans cover five main areas — geology, mechanical engineering, metallurgical engineering and aeronautical engineering. Three areas are prioritized in space technology and six major goals are announced. All this comes after having first set out their 100 Year Vision of Greatness. They appear to be giving themselves a breathing space, telling the world they are interested in cooperation and also giving themselves a major target, in much the same way as John F Kennedy did for the USA."

Comments

It's easier when you have a target

[jonnythan]

It's a lot easier to make technological gains when you're essentially trying to copy the technologies already in use in other parts of the world.

Re:It's easier when you have a target

[qwijibo]

It worked well for Japan and the auto industry. They started with making inferior copies cheaply, figured out how to improve the quality without substantially increasing the cost, and now American manufacturers are second rate.

Though, there have been some impressive contributions to the crypto community from chinese researchers recently. They're already ahead of the curve in some fields.

Re:It's easier when you have a target

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a bit harsh -- it's more accurate to say that the Japanese had the good sense to embrace Deming and then THEY ran with it.

Toyota Lean Production methods (for instance) are far from trivial -- otherwise you'd see Detroit cranking out quality cars as well if it was just a matter of simply "copying" Deming's work.

Hooray

[stratjakt]

America needs more propoganda like this.

They got any plans to start respecting human rights?

this is all well and nice but

[xlurker]

it would be nicer if they also started investing more interest in human rights, democratic ideals, freedom of speech, free press, no censorship, political pluralism, open competition of ideas and on and on and on.

Science is a system and culture based on open discourse, accountability and merit. A culture that strives for good science should also honour these values in itself.

Re:this is all well and nice but

[192939495969798999]

Forget China, I'd like to see the USA start "investing more interest in human rights, democratic ideals, freedom of speech, free press, no censorship, political pluralism, open competition of ideas and on and on and on!"

Re:this is all well and nice but

[hax4bux]

Some science leadership would also be nice

Re:this is all well and nice but

[lawpoop]

"We, in the USA, lock up our criminals, not our politically undesireable."

Every society defines its own crime. The "political undesirable" were criminals, in Soviet Russia. What is wrong with American society that we have so many criminals? Are there more criminals, or more *crimes* -- behaviors that in the past did not result in imprisonment, but now do?

Are things really getting worse on the street, or are three-strikes laws and 0-tolerance drug policies for non-violent offenders locking up people who are otherwise productive members of society?

This CS Monitor article says that we now lead the world in incarceration: "More than 5.6 million Americans are in prison or have served time there, according to a new report by the Justice Department released Sunday. That's 1 in 37 adults living in the United States, the highest incarceration level in the world."

" We don't send entire families to gulags. We don't execute or exile our Jews, gays, and minorities. Were exiles (internal) counted in your prison figures? I bet not."

You know what? You might be right. We might not actually have worse incarceration rates than Soviet Russia. But I'm sick of not being the worst. I believe that America is the greatest country on Earth. I think we should have the lowest incarceration rate in the world, right now, not just lower than Soviet Russia.

This ABC article says that "The United States has incarcerated 726 people per 100,000 of its population, seven to 10 times as many as most other democracies. The rate for England is 142 per 100,000, for France 91 and for Japan 58. " Why are we getting beaten by Japan, France, and England? Why aren't we on top?

You can't impose liberty. You grow it.

[Colin Smith]

human rights, democratic ideals, freedom of speech, free press, no censorship, political pluralism, open competition of ideas and on and on and on. These things will all come with a middle class who demand them. You have to build that middle class up first. This is what a lot of people don't get. It's the middle class, who are financially independent, not the working class who demand change. Funnily enough, it's money which allows freedom to flourish.

Re:You can't impose liberty. You grow it.

[meringuoid]

The middle class and the rich by definition have something to loose. They are the last people to want any kind of uncertainty and change always brings uncertainty. The middle class and the rich would only throw their weight in to help the poor if they themselves had something to loose by not doing so.

"Workers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains!"

Maybe, but the leaders of the revolution are usually comfortable middle-class intellectuals and student cadres, people freed from the daily necessity of earning their bread and with the leisure time to, say, debate ideology and distribute progressive literature.

The workers do have a great deal to lose. The British miners in the 1980s were highly motivated, politically informed and highly idealistic, but enough of them were prepared to scab once they saw their families suffering because of the strike; in the end Thatcher won. A 25% drop in the rich man's pay means he drives a smaller car and goes on holiday only once a year, or only within his home continent. A 25% drop in the worker's pay means his children go hungry. Not to mention that the rich man's wealth gives him substantially greater resources which he can use to make a difference.

Re:You can't impose liberty. You grow it.

[be-fan]

The poor have never contributed anything to any society, and they never will. The poor are the biggest danger to democracy, precisely because they have nothing to lose. They are easily appeased by corrupt governments that will give them temporary handouts by taking away from more productive elements of society. I don't disagree that the upper classes in wealthy countries can get apathetic, but at the same time there are very few examples of truely free societies which are not dominated by the interests of the middle and upper class.

Name a single society in history where the lower classes were the driving force for democracy? The democratic revolutions in the West (the United States, Britain, France) were driven by the interests of the commercial elite. Now, list the countries where corrupt governments came to power by making empty promises to the poor, who were only too happy to believe whatever they heard? Latin America, South-East Asia, and Africa are full of examples.

Wait...

[sepharious]

are you talking about our government or theirs? I get confused these days...

Re:What's the fourth main area?

[Marxist Hacker 42]

Ecconomic Warfare of course.

This is just a shot fired across the bow of globalization. But since the globalists are all worshipers of Mao, this resurgence of national identity for China will go unnoticed.

The ??? step

[novus ordo]

Importing technology by exporting artificially cheap goods made with that technology?

Definition

[Marxist Hacker 42]

These things will all come with a middle class who demand them. You have to build that middle class up first. This is what a lot of people don't get. It's the middle class, who are financially independent, not the working class who demand change. Funnily enough, it's money which allows freedom to flourish.

This must be some strange meaning of the words "middle class" of which I have not previously been aware. Last I saw, "Middle Class" in the United States was defined as having incomes in the $36,000-$120,000 range; which while certainly comfortable and able to afford a few luxuries and assets, is certainly NOT what I'd call "financially independant" or "not working class".

Other than that I agree with you- as did George Orwell. The working poor can't afford to revolt- 100% of their time is spent just trying to survive. The rich are profiting from the status quo, they aren't going to change anything. Only with a middle class, who suffer due to worker conditions and prosper with a robust economy, can these changes be made.

Kennedy dreams

[sepharious]

I find it interesting that the submitter brings up Kennedy and long range goals and visions. I've been pondering on this subject for some time now and it seems that America has lost its vision. We're trapped in a day-to-day shitfest wondering what celebrities are doing while waiting on our next paycheck to go buy some other piece of junk manufactured in said Red Country. What happened to dreaming of putting men in places they've never been and returning alive to tell the tale? Our government of today has paid the due lip service of "man on Mars....eventually", but where is the far vision? Why have we not heard something of this ilk: "First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of reducing the percentage of energy we import and continuing that trend until such time as we are energy independent"? Or "First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of balancing our budget and wisely investing surpluses in areas to maximize American potential in perpetuity." Werner von Braun thought we could have gone to Mars in the Eighties. Instead we're mucking around on planet Earth fighting a combat technique as if it were a thinking, independent entity. I want something to work towards, a dream to live. I don't want to go nine to five for forty years so I can plop my fat ass on the couch and watch the Britneys and Paris' of the future on my SuperTivo(tm). I want a country that's worth living in and living for. But maybe that's too much to ask...

Re:Cultural differences

[rbarreira]

That's like telling the dead man "there are not many killers". What good does that do to him?

Re:Read as...

[A beautiful mind]

You can't fucking steal knowledge! Your post is not only ignorant and racist, but is characteristically showing what is wrong with the direction the USA is heading towards.

Re:Why is that a troll?

[OldeTimeGeek]

It's a Friday and I'm bored, so I'll bite.

Let's say that it's around 1915, your name is Thomas J. Watson and you've just been been hired to help out a company called Computing- Tabulating- Recording Company. Your job is to come up with a hundred-year plan to help the company sell their tabulating and time-recording devices to businesses. Please account for technologies that haven't been invented yet, materials that haven't been discovered or invented, a couple of wars, advances in travel and communications, a depression that wiped out most of the valuation of the country, radical changes in culture and a space program. What's your plan?

Too tough? Ok, let's try for 50 years. Please account for multiple "police actions" with other countries, a revolution in electronics, two wars, the creation of global communication infrastructure based upon technology that doesn't yet exist and a revolution in miniaturization, satellites and an attempt at a landing on the Moon.

Wanna try for a twenty-five-year plan? Add computers that are cheap enough to be bought by normal people. You get the point.

BTW, if the name isn't a hint as to what that company became, here's another: who has the most patents?

China is not a planned economy!

[ordovician.cenozoic]

Alternately, China could stop dicking around with piecemeal reform and institute capitalism, democracy, and the rule of law. If China had half the per-capita GNP of Tiawan, they could easily surpass the United States economically. But as long as they cling to the vestiges of a totalitarian command economy, they won't do it. China can hardly be called a communist country anymore. That would only be on paper. China is just another capitalist dictatorship. I don't know were you got the idea they they still have a command economy? Right now China could probably not have done any better economically than they do. Citing Taiwans GDP is futile. China started going down the capitalist path much later. They have much more catching up to do. But at +10% growth a year I don't see how a radical reform like you suggest could do any better. I mean, you don't think they are doing any good until they have +20% growth? However what western style democracy and capitalism could bring is a more sustainable and healthy growth. A growth that doesn't destroy the environment as much as current Chinese growth and that doesn't stomp on reqular people, and doesn't cause dangerous buildups of structural weakness in the economy. But as Iraq showed, you can't introduce Democracy over night. American way of thinking about Democracy is inherently broken. Because the US was made a democracy after one war of independence, they think the same can be done elsewhere. Forgetting that the US was a export of European liberal ideas and institutions that had matured in Europe over centuries. These ideas and institutions have to mature in China too.