Australia released a report saying that China has leading research over the US in almost every critical field:
https://www.aspi.org.au/report/aspis-two-decade-critical-technology-tracker
This highlights the importance for the US of working with allies, they point out.
6 comments:
Maybe it won't matter since humans could become extinct soon anyways. After all it is better dead than red, as the saying goes, so perhaps this is all for the best.
For example check out this video which says AI may kill everyone in the next few years --- they cite someone who gives it a 70% chance I think:
https://youtu.be/8kBd0CM5tuA?si=j9Mr-Pyc1uNBfHrx
How will AI kill everyone in a few years? I think the AI thing is a bit of bubble.
The thing about China is that they are more committed to TRL 4-9 research while the US funds TRL 1-3 and some 8 and 9. As a result, we develop the basic science and then China takes our work and deploys it. The valley of death is so wide now that once you demonstrate a basic principle, nobody will fund it. We spend all of our time chasing the shiny new object and incrementally advancing 50 year old technology. The basic research to deployed product pipeline is broken, with the exception of IT and software.
10:44 -- is this exactly true? The US has many startup companies, as you know, and deep capital markets, meaning that money can flood into strategic areas. We have some success stories, such as Nvidia recently becoming one of the world's very largest companies by market cap, and SpaceX launching its huge rocket. Fracking has been a huge success for energy independence, allowing the growth of the petrochemical industry as well.
The Chinese are advancing older technology more than we are -- low cost silicon solar cells for example, mass production of steel and concrete, coal power plants, use of cheap labor rather than automation.
You know, the Chips act for domestic semiconductor manufacturing has some recent problems. Intel got rid of 15000 workers, and their stock has plunged, losing 60% of its value since the beginning of 2024. There has also been a string of not-so-great news, although their turnaround still seems to be in place somehow. They may be removed from the Dow index, of course, Reuters also reported issues with their new semiconductor process 18A which will be released in the future, and the 20A node has been removed from their roadmap. There have also been failures of high-end gaming CPU's due to motherboard issues, and Intel has had to extend the warranty as a result.
You know, most good physicists believe in the many-worlds theory. If we truly believe in the "better dead than red" theory we can simply build a doomsday device of some sort capable of causing human extinction and employ it in the worlds where Red China triumphs, this will leave behind an infinite set of universes where the US triumphs, cheating them of their victory. This would have the added benefit that the doomsday device could be used to avoid all sorts of bad outcomes, in effect giving the US complete control over our destiny, and complete control over future events, lowering the risk of future wars, terrorist attacks, economic problems, transportation accidents, failed medical procedures, and even weather events such as hurricanes and tornadoes to zero (at least from the viewpoint of the many worlds which would escape total destruction).
The existence of such a doomsday device might be highly demoralizing to the Chinese communists, and indeed they might be easier to deal with, although we would have to guard against them building their own doomsday device to cause human extinction so as to enact a similar plan -- we would have to set off our own device at the first sign or suspicion of this!
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