
China’s AI Awakening - eaxitect
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/609038/chinas-ai-awakening/?set=
======
nopinsight
Key competitive advantages of China are their strength in quantitative skills,
a huge population, and the hard working and competitive culture of the
populace.

An objective measure is PISA results [1]. When comparing with even the best
performing US state, Massachusetts, China has many more top performers in
Math, as a proportion of population [2].

(In 2015 only four provinces of China participated, but their combined
population was 230 million vs Massachusetts's 6.8 million. The math result of
Shanghai (24 million pop.) alone would show an even larger gap.)

Since PISA results are scaled such that OECD country's mean is 500 and
standard deviation is 100, China's 531 math score implies country mean at 0.3
SD above PISA mean, and US' math score at 470 implies 0.3 SD below mean. If
people capable of doing AI research or proper AI implementation need to have
math skills at, say, 2 SD above PISA mean, then there will be a tremendous
difference in proportion between two populations with 0.6 SD difference.

My back-of-the-envelope calculation, assuming above figures, is the proportion
will be about five times as large. But China has more than 4 times the
population of the US, so the difference in _potential_ numbers of AI-capable
natives could be around 20 times. (Since other provinces may drag down China's
mean, it could be a bit less. An opposite influence is increasing wealth and
thus more resources devoted to education, both by parents and the state. We'll
see soon since China as a whole will participate in PISA 2018.)

Moreover, the Chinese government is pushing AI and programming education into
their education system, starting from the primary level [3].

The distinct advantage of the US is that it is the magnet for top talents and
ambitious people from all over the world, including the Chinese, so it might
continue to lead for a while. However, if the US becomes inhospitable to
talents or _potential_ talents, it is clear that China with its quality and
quantity of human resources will soon take the lead.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programme_for_International_St...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programme_for_International_Student_Assessment#China)

[2]
[http://www.compareyourcountry.org/pisa/country/usa1?lg=en](http://www.compareyourcountry.org/pisa/country/usa1?lg=en)

[3]
[http://en.people.cn/n3/2017/0828/c90000-9261282.html](http://en.people.cn/n3/2017/0828/c90000-9261282.html)

~~~
dxbydt
pardon my ignorance, but what is the specific correlation of math skills to
dominance in AI ? yes, AI/ML/dnn uses substantial amounts of linear algebra,
much the way accountancy uses large amounts of arithmetic. but we don’t see
mathematicians racing to be accountants. i have specifically written to
several math departments in the US asking if they do any sort of AI/ML related
graduate research. Even schools that offer courses like “math of deep
learning” are happy to confess that this is just a bait - they are using that
course title to hook more students to sign up, but the course content is plain
old eigenvalues and matrix decompositions and what used to previously be
called “advanced linear algebra”. you aren’t likely to get any AI
breakthroughs from math folks - that is simply not the focus of math depts. i
have correspondended with several COLT folks who deal with the theoretical end
of sgd/neural nets/ statistical learning, and even there the correlation with
math is expendable.

now if you are talking statistics, in particular applied statistics, most of
those departments are retooling by hiring ml folks from csee departments. but
the bread and butter courses required to get a stat phd remain the same as
they were a decade ago - 2 core inference courses, 2 core math-stat measure
theoretic courses, 2 courses on experimental stats. literally no stat dept
mandates an ML course, though a few do allow ml as an elective. now, all of
this can and will change over the next few years, but its very early days.

essentially, predicating ai dominance on raw math skills is a mistake. there’s
no significant correlation.

~~~
yorwba
The PISA test (at least when I took it) measures math skills in calculation,
i.e. the kind of applied mathematics that academic departments write off as
too trivial. Nonetheless, those are the skills that are required for Deep
Learning as well as accountancy.

You could make an argument that high performers on the PISA test would find AI
and accountancy too boring and would go into pure mathematics instead; but I
don't think those proportions would be different between countries, so a
higher potential (schoolchildren with good math skills) should still translate
into more AI researchers, on average.

~~~
AlexCoventry
> those are the skills that are required for Deep Learning

Why do you believe that?

~~~
yorwba
Rereading that, I should have worded it as "those are skills that are required
for Deep Learning research". There are of course a bunch of other skills you
need to be successful, but you won't get far without being comfortable with
linear algebra and calculus.

To answer your question, I believe that because I haven't yet seen a Deep
Learning paper which did not couch its results in terms of those, even if it
might not have been strictly necessary. If you do not understand the basics of
current approaches, you'll have a hard time developing them further.

------
shadowmint
Extremely relevant quote from the talented Mr Ng:

> “When the Chinese government announces a plan like this, it has significant
> implications for the country and the economy,” says Andrew Ng, a prominent
> AI expert who previously oversaw AI technology and strategy at China’s
> biggest online search company, Baidu. “It’s a very strong signal to everyone
> that things will happen.”

ie. There is going to be a tonne of money poured into this.

Will it make a difference, tangibly to economic transformation? Who knows...

...but anyone sitting here scoffing that China can’t make itself a world
leader in a field by simply pouring money and support onto the problem needs a
serious history lesson.

They have before, and there is every indiction they will again, here with
this.

More interesting: will it be as transformative as everyone is hoping?

~~~
monkmartinez
> ...but anyone sitting here scoffing that China can’t make itself a world
> leader in a field by simply pouring money and support onto the problem needs
> a serious history lesson. They have before, and there is every indiction
> they will again, here with this.

What are they currently leading?

~~~
ww520
One example where they poured money and got ahead is the rail system and the
high speed rail system.

~~~
0xbear
Their maglev train was built by Siemens and ThyssenKrupp in Germany, the
_real_ leader in high speed rail transportation.

~~~
strin
Their high-speed rail train is not maglev. There is one built by Germany in
Shanghai, but it was more of a demo than an actual infrastructure.

------
YeGoblynQueenne
I'm getting a bit of a flashback to the Japanese Fifth Gneeration Computing
project (I wasn't around back then; I've read about it though).

Then, too, an East Asian country (Japan) known for excellence in one field
(manufacturing) initiated a state-funded research project into a promising
technology (AI). Then, too, the West reacted with alarm, fearing the Asians
would leave them in the dust. Then, too, the project was about AI.

Except, back then, it didn't go too well [1]. But, perhaps this is just
pattern matching failure on my part and nothing is even remotely the same
today.

____________________

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_generation_computer](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_generation_computer)

~~~
nopinsight
The current crop of AIs is already starting to make a big impact in commercial
and other spheres. All of the major tech giants in the US and China are using
AI in their offerings and behind the scenes. There are substantial differences
between the two eras.

------
strin
Another competitive advantage of China is data. China has 1.4B population, and
nearly everyone in the country owns a mobile phone. This will contribute data
3-4 times larger than US. Considering second-order interactions (network
effect), the data could be an order of magnitude larger.

Chinese citizen also seems less concerned about their privacy. I've talked to
one of the largest chat platforms in China, and they seems very open to share
their conversation datasets with third-parties for dialogue research.

In high-value verticals like healthcare, there is also less regulation
compared to U.S. For example, it's easy to start a AI + radiology company in
China and have access to hospital patient data, without going through tedious
approval process.

~~~
eighthnate
Excellent point. But you have to factor in american companies international
reach. Chinese companies dominate china and that is extremely lucrative, but
american tech companies dominate europe and the americas and the rest of the
world.

Europe and at americas combined have a larger population than china and a
geographical landmass 3X larger than china.

The real question is why europe ( 800 million people ) and latin america ceded
their tech industry and data to the US.

If data is the oil of the 21st century, then the US, china and india are going
to rule the nest. Europe has no future and neither does south america.

I under why china, russia, etc had protected their own internal industries to
compete against FB, GOOGL, TWTR, AMZN, etc. I just don't understand why
europe, south america, etc haven't.

All europe/south america have/had to do is invest a few billion to capture a
few trillion in wealth. Instead, they've ceded all that wealth to
predominately american tech companies. It's very strange when you think about
it.

~~~
nrhk
Is it though, your talking about a federation of democratic and culturally
different nations to two locked down regimes with homogeneous societies.

I don't think Europe could do what China and Russia did even if they tried.

~~~
tellarin
You're very mistaken if you think either Russia or China are homogeneous
societies.

And I'm not sure Russia can be considered a locked down regime in recent
years. Unless you mean specifically Putin's grasp on power.

------
indescions_2017
Hmmm. MIT Tech Review now behind cognito-only browser shield? Is that new?

What's really interesting is the continued trend of cashless WeChat Pay
adoption in China versus say trickling Digital Payments penetration here in
USA. I actually just had to order a new replacement set of paper checks. And
its simply due to the fact that so many small merchants cite higher credit
card fees as a reason for preferring cash or checks for payments.

Coupled with AI, I think this preference for instant, fee-less digital
payments will translate into convenience stores without cashiers. Auto repair
shops where you just drop off your faulty electric vehicle and hop into a
loaner without actually interacting with a customer service agent. And
thousands of other technology-mediated retail experiences.

It's Asian consumer adoption and demand driving AI solutions from the bottom
up. And that makes it much more likely to result in first mover advantage and
the potential for game-changing breakthroughs.

~~~
rcpt
One advantage China has in payments is the lack of incumbent credit
corporations. In the United States credit cards were widely deployed and
trusted decades ago while in China tech companies have an open playing field
where real innovation can happen fast.

~~~
randcraw
That's a competitive advantage when it arises against competitors that you're
willing to destroy. But in the years ahead, China's major competition will
arise increasingly within China. That portends a lot of internal disruption of
the status quo which the government is unlikely to anticipate (like the
ongoing explosion of e-commerce there and its immeasurable disruption of the
day-to-day lives of established retailers).

Despite China's outward enthusiasm for advancement, high speed change promises
to destabilize the totalitarian gov't, which suggests that a bumpy ride lies
ahead.

------
dataronin
I am a Chinese born AI researcher and I've had most of my higher education in
the US. The funny thing is that when I was a high schooler in China, I was not
particularly good at math and basically hated anything quantitative. There are
two points I want to make to counter some of the arguments people have brought
up.

First, even though Chinese high schoolers are "better" at math and there are
certainly many gifted kids, it does not necessarily mean that they are better
at abstract thinking and will excel at higher levels. On the other hand, some
of the most talented people I know did not have super impressive test scores.
They are insatiably curious and think from first principles.

Second, if you look at the top researchers today, you'll find their strength
comes from combining knowledge from different disciplines, e.g. computer
science and neuroscience. The education system in China pretty much hones
students in a single dimension, pushing them into a narrow corner. Also, the
most important thing in research is not just understanding what has been done.
It is thinking critically and challenging authority. Unfortunately, in my
opinion, this really goes against the Chinese regime and Chinese culture to a
large extent.

I wouldn't be surprised by a large number of future Chinese AI "engineers" who
can quickly replicate the latest research. But I think China has a long way to
go in order to create an environment that allows students to freely explore
and think before a real AI breakthrough.

------
AElsinore77
Another key trend to consider - China's labor costs are growing up to 2x per
year: [https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/10/23/welcoming-
our-...](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/10/23/welcoming-our-new-
robot-overlords)

China's push for AI is a recognition that the loss of one advantage (cheap
human labor) could be replaced by another (cheap machine labor).

~~~
rahimnathwani
They're not growing 2x every year. Even the article you linked says "“China’s
labor costs are increasing, or doubling, every few years,”"

In any case, the advantage of cheap human labour has _already_ been replaced
by what you call 'cheap machine labour'. China has been able to dominate
manufacturing in large part by giving companies access to cheap capital, which
allows them to invest in machines. Silicon chips aren't made by hand. PCBs
aren't soldered by hand.

------
noetic_techy
Has China produced a single major AI breakthrough with all these cited papers?
Just because they have a lot of papers written doesn't mean anything. Quality
vs Quantity. You can take technology developed by others and copy it all you
want, and assign all your grad students to write something publishable about
it, but unless you innovate in it, I wouldn't say you are a world leader. At
best you may see novel applications of AI tasking come out of China, and
people will falsely equate this with "China is beating us at AI." I still
think the General AI breakthrough will come from Western researchers out of
the box thinking.

~~~
AlexCoventry
Yes, lots. StackGAN comes to mind.

------
LostInTheWoods2
_The plan calls for homegrown AI to match that developed in the West within
three years, for China’s researchers to be making “major breakthroughs” by
2025, and for Chinese AI to be the envy of the world by 2030._

Really? Major breakthroughs can be mandated by a centralized government? Back
in the 80s-90s, Americans were convinced that Japan was going to eat its
lunch. It gives me some hope in knowing that we still suffer from this
complex.

~~~
TeMPOraL
US government basically mandated the Moon landings, and they happened within
12 years from Sputnik. So I'd say yes, sometimes a government can just mandate
progress.

~~~
SomeStupidPoint
Dont DARPA and other US gov research groups have a pretty long track record of
successful projects?

Computers, nukes, ICs, space, internet, self-driving cars, etc.

They seem to be some of the most well used research money -- precisely the
government mandating progress.

~~~
forapurpose
> Dont DARPA and other US gov research groups have a pretty long track record
> of successful projects?

And many failures too. You can't just buy whatever innovation you want with
money; if that were true we wouldn't still have energy problems and powerlines
for distributing it.

~~~
TeMPOraL
If you don't allow for failures, you won't get successes either. That's the
problem of today - research is increasingly being done in market-driven style,
which strongly favors short-term work that the sales department can turn into
perceived miracle over long-term, uncertain but possibly high-impact projects.

------
bluetwo
Whenever I read articles like this I'm really looking for the million dollar
idea. Solving Go is good. Solving Poker is better. Best would be solving a
high-value business problem for which a solution using AI can be developed.

~~~
dirtyaura
Arguably high-value business problems that are currently being solved by AI
and ML methods: 1) serving personalized ads, 2) efficient stock and commodity
trading 3) fraud detection

~~~
bluetwo
Sure, and I would add to the list recommendation (Amazon/Netflix)...

But I'm looking for things where the technology has yet to be applied.

~~~
fooker
>I would add to the list recommendation

You bought a 3000$ DSLR yesterday.. Why not buy a 1000$ one today?

~~~
bluetwo
I didn't say it was perfect, but at least when it is wrong, it is funny.

------
dis-sys
I was reading the USNews CS ranking yesterday, got really surprised that
apparently some Chinese universities are now considered as the best in CS.

top 20 list:

[https://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-
universities/se...](https://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-
universities/search?region=&subject=computer-science&name=)

[https://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-
universities/co...](https://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-
universities/computer-science?page=2)

~~~
tooltalk
Well, it's interesting to see that the USNews ranks Harvard ahead of
UCBerkeley. Back when I used to work at a quant shop in NYC, Harvard wasn't
even considered for hiring -- they only recruited from MIT, CMU, UIUC,
Berkeley, Stanford and UToronto.

Also, not surprisingly, most quants were Chinese.

~~~
barry-cotter
Trust your own expertise. I can’t find the paper where I got this from but if
you rank CS departments by where professors got their doctorates and where
they end up teaching the basically equal top four were Carnegie Mellon, MIT,
Berkeley and Stanford. Which four would round out the world Top 10? Georgia
Tech?

Aren’t a ton of quants French as well?

------
potbelly83
What I never understood, if China is so great, why then do large parts of
their upper middle class/upper class buy property in foreign countries and
send their kids to school their? It's not as if the American upper class are
purchasing houses in Beijing for their kids.

~~~
beisner
The United States was once seen as uncultured, unrefined, and frankly quite
weak by most of Western Europe until the late 1800's. And in many respects it
was. Now the US is the richest country in the world, and is where wealthy non-
Americans send their children and make land investments.

My point is that trajectory is more relevant to these discussions than current
state of affairs. The quality of life of the average Chinese citizen (and more
so the upper-middle class Chinese citizen) has increased DRAMATICALLY in the
last 40 years. So when people talk about China's potential, they aren't
talking about the situation in the next 5 or 10 years. They're talking about
who is going exert massive international influence in the next 50 years. So
you're right, most westerners aren't buying speculative property in Beijing
(despite the fact that housing in central Beijing is nearly as expensive as
New York City), but I'd wager there's a good chance of that changing in the
next 50 years.

~~~
indemnity
I think a missing piece of the puzzle is: It’s not clear to me that my
property rights would be respected, should I be able to buy property in China
(which, as a foreigner, I can’t do anyway, the government only leases it to
you at best).

Western countries have a much better record in this regard.

~~~
beisner
While you’re technically correct about the government leasing property, in
practice buying the rights to land for residential use is in practice
effectively the same as buying the land. There are a lot of things like that
in China, where the system is nominally socialist, but in practice things are
just as capitalistic (if not more so) as they are in western countries.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
This hasn’t been tested yet. There was a huge scandal in Wenzhou when the
local government was going to charge market prices for renewing leases there
(their property market started earlier with shorter leases before 70 years was
settled on nationally). The central government had to step in and make the
leases turn over automatically, because the precedent set in Wenzhou could
tank markets nationwide.

I bet China eventually scraps the lease system and replaces it with a
universal property tax, which would solve the other problem of keeping local
governments funded long term (right now they just make money on sales), while
naturally deprecating the property on a yearly basis, and also making pure
speculation much more difficult.

But who can say. If china switches to a property tax system (not just the
nominal one easily gamed in shanghai and chongqing today), it would break a
lot of buying assumptions.

------
Dowwie
there was a time when the U.S. had a leader who declared a bipartisan mission
to do something great and worthy of the effort and the U.S. accomplished that
mission:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuW4oGKzVKc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuW4oGKzVKc)
\-- fast forward to ~7:40minutes for most relevant

AI is the new moon shot of our time but its rally cries are emanating by
leaders of U.S corporations for the maximization of profit of their
shareholders where as in China they are emanating by the leaders of the state
for reasons far exceeding short-term economic gains

------
rdrey
Sorry, my questions might reflect that I don't know much about China / Chinese
culture. I'm curious about compensation. Can Chinese AI researchers earn
equally well in China as abroad? Or are they going to suffer from brain drain
eventually? How does the Communist Party / society deal with large pay gaps?
Are Chinese companies with AI departments looking for international talent
that's not at the uppermost level?

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Yes. China pays well, not just for AI researchers, but specialized tech talent
in general. They attract workers from Taiwan, Korea, Japan for the better
paycheck accordingly, where tech workers aren’t valued as much.

------
killjoywashere
Pro tip for folks looking to take a job with a Chinese company: this will
prevent you from jumping to some jobs in the US. The defense sector will want
you to be not employed by the Chinese for at least a year before letting you
work on defense-related jobs (yes, they will audit your employer).

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Well, if you marry a Chinese, you can also kiss your security clearance
goodbye. I don’t think it matters to most of outside the DC/Virginia area.

~~~
killjoywashere
There's a fair amount of DoD contract work being done all over the country.

------
it_learnses
Scientists like Ng ought to consider the repercussions of their actions when
they decide to aid Chinese companies, and by extension, the Chinese govt with
cutting edge research. They are basically collaborating with the enemy that
stands against pretty much everything that the west granted them (scientists
like Ng who were born here and given the opportunities).

~~~
timthelion
I believe that your pro-western nationalism is evil, because this dualism
fails to see the nuance, that american corporatism is just as bad as Chinese
state socialism. I up-voted you, however, because you stated your opinion in
the open, rather than simply implying it. I'd far rather people like you be
open in their belief that this is some sort of situation where one country
wins and the other loses.

I, however, believe that whoever wins this battle will be wealthy and
powerful. Who-ever wins the race is the enemy. Not just the Chinese, but
anyone who attains singularity is the enemy of the rest of humanity.

Even if that AI is open-source, unless there is a clear way for every person
to have some level of control over the hardware that it runs on, the AI
becomes the enemy of all people who will be disenfranchised by it.

~~~
elefanten
This phrasing was really blunt and came off a bit rude. But there is a point
there that shouldn't be written off. As far as choosing who the biggest and
most powerful entity on the planet is, would you rather have one with more or
less respect for the rights of individuals?

Because, so far in human history, individual rights-based political
formulations are the only ones that prevent arbitrary atrocities from being
perpetrated on citizens. Yes, American corporatism is brutal. American
corporatism bounded by American democracy, imperfect as it is, is still vast
leagues better (read: safer for global population) than nationalist
authoritarian dictatorship. No matter how technocratically efficient that
dictatorship has been in recent decades.

In short, if you're worried about singularities, aren't you worried about the
priorities and command structure of the entities most likely to achieve it?
About what options they consider to be "on the table"?

~~~
timthelion
Of course I am worried about the command structure of the entities most likely
to acheive singularity, but this is all the more reason to fight against a
nationalist, McCarthyist, "you traitor!" attitude which would lead America, in
its competition with China, away from its liberal ideals and towards a more
efficient command structure such as fascism or national corporatism.

------
idibidiart
Thb, most of the interesting work I've seen has come out of Silicon Valley.
What breakthroughs have come from China?

~~~
abhinavkulkarni
Most 'breakthroughs' in AI have come from Canada, not Silicon Valley.

~~~
ghostbrainalpha
Canada is definitely underappreciated, but you might be overstating it a
bit...

[https://www.forbes.com/sites/jpmorganchase/2017/10/04/chicag...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/jpmorganchase/2017/10/04/chicago-
collaborative-sets-sights-on-restoring-a-nearly-vacant-town/#300bcb3a55b4)

