
China again boosts R&D spending by more than 10% - pseudolus
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/08/china-again-boosts-rd-spending-more-10
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Taek
I think this is a very good move for China and think the US should match it.

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KaoruAoiShiho
If you actually read the article we already outspend them on R&D. We spent
2.8% of GDP vs their 2.2% of GDP. They failed to meet their target of 2.5% of
GDP despite steadily increasing.

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mistermann
I wonder how it would look if there was some magical way to view it on an ROI
basis.

Rather than focusing on R&D (science & technology presumably), I'd like to see
Western countries start approaching ~"the humanities" (culture, society,
happiness, etc) the same way we treat technology and industry. To me it seems
fairly clear that there are distinct differences at the human satisfaction
level between different countries/cultures. I have the sense that Western
countries are starting to fall behind in some categories, the consequences of
which first began showing up in our political discourse/mood, which has now
progressed to literally spilling out onto the streets. Rather than our current
laissez faire approach to this aspect of life, could treating it as a
_serious_ first class intellectual problem yield positive results?

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sct202
China once had a large emphasis on humanities, the Imperial Exams used to be
primarily tests and essays on classical books, philosophy, and poetry.
Science, engineering, and math were not important. It did not turn out well
for them.

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mistermann
From a logical perspective, should one conclude from this that effort invested
into the humanities is a waste of time? If not, what meaning should one take
from it (and, how might we confirm whether that meaning is reasonably optimal
from a "social engineering" perspective)?

The explicit mechanics of how society makes optimized decisions on public
policy and spending seems like an area that needs improvement. Specific areas
of what I refer to are global climate change, rules on wearing masks during
pandemics, taxation, etc - the manner in which we currently approach such
questions seems _extremely_ sub-optimal to me, to the degree that I sometimes
wonder if some approaches may be in part designed to be confusing and
dysfunctional.

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rvba
Can those numbers be trusted?

[https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/21/nobody-knows-
anything-a...](https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/03/21/nobody-knows-anything-
about-china/)

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bserge
At the very least we know Chinese companies (and by extension, the government)
do indeed spend a lot on research, development and production.

The sheer amount of tech made and shipped from China is astonishing. And the
quality has massively improved, while prices stay low. Everything from amazing
BGA reballing stations to high quality solar panels and power tools.

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gamblor956
A lot of that IP was stolen from US and EU companies.

Cost isn't the only reason that manufacturing is moving out of China;
companies are finally realizing that using Chinese factories is tantamount to
giving the PRC access to all of your technical IP.

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arcticbull
That's an incredibly short-sighted way of looking at what's happening. If you
want to become a Chef, you don't start by inventing new Michelin star dishes
de novo. You copy your betters. Over and over and over. Then, once you learn
how they do what they do, you innovate.

Japan did this. Do not underestimate China.

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xenospn
There's one major difference - Japanese companies took mediocre western tech
(autos, transistor radios) and made it better. Chinese companies just copy.

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chillacy
Everybody copies at first, then they start making state of the art
improvements.

It takes time though, Toyota was founded in 1937, they started by reverse
engineering Chrystler cars (they were surprisingly open about this in the
Toyota museum). Chinese companies got started maybe around the 1980s with
market reforms.

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mensetmanusman
In principal this is good for humanity so long as the research isn’t directed
towards tools to improve efficiency of repression.

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wintermutestwin
I wonder if anyone has tried to measure repression's "drag coefficient" effect
on creativity.

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fleischhauf
This is a very interesting question and one would hope that non repressive
societies are more creative and have a higher scientific output. Im not 100 %
sure thats the case, however.

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wintermutestwin
It seems to me that it would have to. If your society
punishes/limits/eliminates divergent behavior and thought, you are throttling
your innovation lever.

I think that rising D&I budgets are a recognition of this truth.

It seems like common sense to me, but I'd be interested to know if it has been
studied/measured...

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im3w1l
As long as you pay lip service to the right politics you can innovate as much
as you want in science and technologies. You are free to use tabs for
indentation or write your webservice in brainfuck if you want.

What can be a drag on innovation is if there is nepotism. If the leader
appoints his good-for-nothing nephew to science minister. Or if there is
corruption, and well connected incumbents throw up endless barriers for
innovative upcomers. Or if organized crime steal too much value from the
productive people.

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sudosysgen
Indeed. That's why the USSR has some really good scientific research sponsored
by the state while a lot of the good art was underground.

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fsflover
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suppressed_research_in_the_Sov...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suppressed_research_in_the_Soviet_Union)

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sudosysgen
In this context I wouldn't really include the social sciences, which leaves
Biology and Cybernetics that were indeed suppressed for 20-30 years.

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fsflover
why wouldn't you include the societal sciences?

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sudosysgen
Because the comment I was replying to was referring to hard sciences and
technological fields, where you can pay lip service to the ideology and go do
your research.

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tresCommatoso
What if - we hypothetical assume that china one day would become a normal
nation, ruled by a democratic elected government - with power divided by
checks and balances, and a rule of law. Now lets further assume that any
company, that lost ip to the "old regime" gained a title in a international
court that upholds, no matter the current regime. These titles would have
value - that even would increase (after all its parked money). Thus a company,
making a loss due to ip theft, could sell of those future earnings - for
example to a bank.

A bank, could hold on to the title and use it to for example collect the owned
money of the title from people who are involved in the ownership of the title
- as ccp members or parts of a company owned by the ccp.

That way ip-theft, would be nothing, but debt taken from the international
community.. and as the title collection would make it rather bad for those
taking the debt..the accumulating debt would make the regime go bankrupt.

