19 ms·

I guess one thing that is obvious, is that an oppressive country like China can never win the race to attract the brightest, most creative minds. Nowadays peopl

I guess one thing that is obvious, is that an oppressive country like China can never win the race to attract the brightest, most creative minds. Nowadays people have options on where to live and from what I can see, these kind of people mostly prefer to live in more liberal societies.

goatinaboat 7y ago
I guess one thing that is obvious, is that an oppressive country like China can never win the race to attract the brightest, most creative minds. They have over a billion people have have made significant investments over decades to indoctrinate nationalistic fervour. They have zero need to attract anyone. By statistics alone they have more “bright, creative” people than US+UK+EU combined, and far greater willingness to employ those people for national goals. The same people we have working on adtech and similar nonsense.
fspeech 7y ago
This is probably the best defense one can have, but it is not clear that the door will stay open forever.
taobility 7y ago
I am not sure the foreigners, but actually right now more and more Chinese students studying aboard are back to China to work. In case you don't believe it, just added the link from QZ.com: https://qz.com/1342525/chinese-students-increasingly-return-home-after-studying-abroad/ https://qz.com/1342525/chinese-students-increasingly-return-...
onion2k 7y ago
This assumes that having the brightest and most creative people is necessary to become a global superpower. That's a particularly modern and Western way of thinking; a lot of powerful empires in the past got that way by fostering a sense of moral superiority in the ordinary people. The British empire, Ottoman empire, Roman empire, etc were all built on the idea that the people were better than everyone else so it was OK to take from other nations. And it worked - those empires lasted hundreds of years, thousands of years in the case of the Romans. America has been a superpower based on capitalism for under a hundred years. That isn't long enough to see if it's a better way of building power than other philosophies just yet.
- SamReidHughes 7y ago
  "a superpower based on capitalism" This seems to me like a bag of words, not a real concept that means something. It's like saying America is "a superpower based on Christianity," or "a superpower based on immigration," or "a superpower built on the back of slavery," or "a superpower based on the proposition that all men are created equal." Capitalism isn't even a philosophy, it's a side effect of freedom.
  - MichaelMoser123 7y ago
    # Capitalism isn't even a philosophy, it's a side effect of freedom. Is it? In the country where capitalism came from "in 1831 a mere 4,500 men, out of a population of more than 2.6 million people, were entitled to vote in parliamentary elections" http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/citizenship/struggle_democracy/getting_vote.htm http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/citizenship/stru...
    - SamReidHughes 7y ago
      Voting has nothing to do with freedom. And Scotland didn’t invent capitalism, what are you talking about?
      - MichaelMoser123 7y ago
        England / UK invented capitalism. In 1831 you already had GB. (correct quote was that you got 3% of the population as voters - but you argue that it doesn't matter anyway) I don't quite understand what kind of freedom they had at a time when the body that coins all laws was determined by 3% of the population.
nearbuy 7y ago
Would they even need to attract foreigners? They have more people than all of North America and Europe combined.
- AstralStorm 7y ago
  In fact they did attract foreigners, how many businesses want to cozy up to them? Some countries would very much like to deal with their citizens the Chinese way too. They do not need anyone to migrate, which is entirely different.

goatinaboat 7y ago

I guess one thing that is obvious, is that an oppressive country like China can never win the race to attract the brightest, most creative minds. They have over a billion people have have made significant investments over decades to indoctrinate nationalistic fervour. They have zero need to attract anyone. By statistics alone they have more “bright, creative” people than US+UK+EU combined, and far greater willingness to employ those people for national goals. The same people we have working on adtech and similar nonsense.

fspeech 7y ago

This is probably the best defense one can have, but it is not clear that the door will stay open forever.

taobility 7y ago

I am not sure the foreigners, but actually right now more and more Chinese students studying aboard are back to China to work. In case you don't believe it, just added the link from QZ.com: https://qz.com/1342525/chinese-students-increasingly-return-home-after-studying-abroad/ https://qz.com/1342525/chinese-students-increasingly-return-...

onion2k 7y ago

This assumes that having the brightest and most creative people is necessary to become a global superpower. That's a particularly modern and Western way of thinking; a lot of powerful empires in the past got that way by fostering a sense of moral superiority in the ordinary people. The British empire, Ottoman empire, Roman empire, etc were all built on the idea that the people were better than everyone else so it was OK to take from other nations. And it worked - those empires lasted hundreds of years, thousands of years in the case of the Romans. America has been a superpower based on capitalism for under a hundred years. That isn't long enough to see if it's a better way of building power than other philosophies just yet.

SamReidHughes 7y ago
"a superpower based on capitalism" This seems to me like a bag of words, not a real concept that means something. It's like saying America is "a superpower based on Christianity," or "a superpower based on immigration," or "a superpower built on the back of slavery," or "a superpower based on the proposition that all men are created equal." Capitalism isn't even a philosophy, it's a side effect of freedom.
- MichaelMoser123 7y ago
  # Capitalism isn't even a philosophy, it's a side effect of freedom. Is it? In the country where capitalism came from "in 1831 a mere 4,500 men, out of a population of more than 2.6 million people, were entitled to vote in parliamentary elections" http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/citizenship/struggle_democracy/getting_vote.htm http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/citizenship/stru...
  - SamReidHughes 7y ago
    Voting has nothing to do with freedom. And Scotland didn’t invent capitalism, what are you talking about?
    - MichaelMoser123 7y ago
      England / UK invented capitalism. In 1831 you already had GB. (correct quote was that you got 3% of the population as voters - but you argue that it doesn't matter anyway) I don't quite understand what kind of freedom they had at a time when the body that coins all laws was determined by 3% of the population.

nearbuy 7y ago

Would they even need to attract foreigners? They have more people than all of North America and Europe combined.

AstralStorm 7y ago
In fact they did attract foreigners, how many businesses want to cozy up to them? Some countries would very much like to deal with their citizens the Chinese way too. They do not need anyone to migrate, which is entirely different.