4 ms·

I’ll just note that NVidia’s moat has never been inference, and there are many chips used at a much larger scale than Chinese chips for inference like TPUs and

by gpt5 18d ago

I’ll just note that NVidia’s moat has never been inference, and there are many chips used at a much larger scale than Chinese chips for inference like TPUs and AMD chips. The other part is that it’s a bit of a meme here to say that the chip restriction is actually helping China (or shall I say, coordinated effort?). For once, we know that China has put a lot of pressure on the US to relax these controls multiple times. In addition to large chip smuggling networks (e.g. 22% of NVidia’s worldwide revenue magically comes from Singapore, and the ratio has been growing). Lastly, assuming acceleration in AI (which we ARE seeing), there might not be time to China to catch up. The best estimate right now is that the first EUV chips from China will not come out before 2030. By that time who knows how powerful AI will be. All I’m saying is that the discussion is so one sided and a bit baselesss with no nuance, that it seems either a meme/groupthink in the community or coordinated. If anything, the data suggests that the US should increase its export controls and better track the tech supply chain if it wants to further curb Chinese progress.

miroljub 18d ago
> All I’m saying is that the discussion is so one sided and a bit baselesss with no nuance, that it seems either a meme/groupthink in the community or coordinated. If anything, the data suggests that the US should increase its export controls and better track the tech supply chain if it wants to further curb Chinese progress. Or, to put it bluntly, you are a proponent of the trade war.
edgyquant 18d ago
The idea that China wasn’t working hard to build their own chips is a political talking point period. Nothing has been sped up here, China was always going to do this and the backlash you see from people who are against it is only proof that restrictions do hurt them
- dominotw 18d ago
  > The idea that China wasn’t working hard to build their own chips is a political talking point period. never heard of this 'talking point' . who is even saying this?
  - stanfordkid 18d ago
    It's an implied corollary: when folks say that "blocking US Chips is what led China to build it's own" they are implying it is US export restrictions that pushed China to innovate. OP is saying this isn't necessarily true. I don't think it is either: China seems to have succeeded due to a centrally planned economy that values independence, with high amounts of strategic government led technology investment.
    - vcryan 18d ago
      It can be both. They were already doing it and the situation made it more urgent.
    - dominotw 18d ago
      > OP is saying this isn't necessarily true. but your supposed corollary was > China wasn’t working hard to build their own chips kind of dishonest ?
- true_religion 18d ago
  I do believe your first sentence, but the second one ... doesn't really follow. The unnatural and sudden nature of the US chip embargo has galvanized the Chinese companies to speed up development. It makes economic sense to do so rather than pay inflated rates to essentially smuggle a necessary good, while never knowing if the embargo will be tightened and those under-the-table supply chains dry up as well. Yes, there was a plan, but what was planned for 5 years from now is being done today, because if you wait 5 years, you'll be so far behind thanks to the effect of the embargo.
  - edgyquant 15d ago
    The AI revolution has led to everyone including US companies working to build their own GPUs there is zero proof or reason to think embargo’s are the cause. As I said, China was already working to build their own capacity
menaerus 18d ago
Why do you think the Chinese are not using their ai chips, which afaics are from huawei, to train their models? If that is true, which I think it is, we don't have to wait until 2030 to see if they're gonna match the performance of nvidia GPU. The evidence is already here - glm is among the most competitive models out there.
- gpt5 18d ago
  Look up reports by The Information, DeepSeek’s training of its big models are all done on NVidia’s chips (more than that - on smuggled Blackwell as well). There have been attempts by many Chinese labs to train on Huawei h chips, but they have all been limited to more minor models or distillations of the bigger ones.
  - menaerus 18d ago
    Unless you have the source for the latter it's nothing more than propaganda. Also, DeepSeek report is 2-3 years old, and at that time there were no huawei chips, at least not known to the public. This is a different model, in different age where huawei chips are already delivered into the production as we see
    - gpt5 18d ago
      The Information have reports on this as recent as this summer
      - bigbadfeline 17d ago
        [flagged]
      - menaerus 17d ago
        Do you have a link?
pianopatrick 18d ago
When you say AI will be powerful, what do you mean? Like in terms of national power, will AI let the US fight and win a war against China despite China's size, manufacturing base and possession of nuclear weapons? Will AI let the US beat the Chinese in manufacturing costs and scale despite China's greater adoption of industrial robots and larger number of skilled workers? Or will AI just be really good at writing software? Because if the AI is just really good at writing software, I am not sure why China has to "catch up". Seems to me China can just treat AI like other technologies. Let the US pay most of the R&D costs, then come after and treat the technology as a commodity. Sell it better and cheaper and at scale. I am not sure why it's a big deal for China if China is a few months behind the US in terms of the very frontier AI. Just like I'm not sure if it's a big deal which country has the biggest super computer in the world.
- gpt5 18d ago
  If AI is super human, it can beat any nation with today’s technology. It can recursively self improve while suppressing any other lab (think about how good it is in hacking computer systems). I am not inventing a winner take it all scenario, that is what driving the race.
  - pianopatrick 18d ago
    But, like, how does that smarts lead to beating nations with today's technology? How would an AI stop an incoming nuclear ballistic missile? I've heard on podcasts with MIT professor Ted Postol that based in the laws of physics intercepting these is basically impossible, because of the speeds and physics involved. Can AI discover new physics to overcome those limitations? If AI cannot stop nuclear ballistic missiles, then how does AI give the US power over China? Seems to me that after AI we have the same mutually assured destruction we have today. In which case America cannot really stop China from progressing or threaten China too much. Seems to me being super human intelligent does not inherently guarantee power. Just like the smartest person in the world does not always win in a fist fight or a gun fight or war. I.e. Stephen Hawking might have been smart, but he did not have physical strength and power. Power and smarts are not always related.

by gpt5 18d ago

miroljub 18d ago

> All I’m saying is that the discussion is so one sided and a bit baselesss with no nuance, that it seems either a meme/groupthink in the community or coordinated. If anything, the data suggests that the US should increase its export controls and better track the tech supply chain if it wants to further curb Chinese progress. Or, to put it bluntly, you are a proponent of the trade war.

edgyquant 18d ago

The idea that China wasn’t working hard to build their own chips is a political talking point period. Nothing has been sped up here, China was always going to do this and the backlash you see from people who are against it is only proof that restrictions do hurt them

dominotw 18d ago
> The idea that China wasn’t working hard to build their own chips is a political talking point period. never heard of this 'talking point' . who is even saying this?
- stanfordkid 18d ago
  It's an implied corollary: when folks say that "blocking US Chips is what led China to build it's own" they are implying it is US export restrictions that pushed China to innovate. OP is saying this isn't necessarily true. I don't think it is either: China seems to have succeeded due to a centrally planned economy that values independence, with high amounts of strategic government led technology investment.
  - vcryan 18d ago
    It can be both. They were already doing it and the situation made it more urgent.
  - dominotw 18d ago
    > OP is saying this isn't necessarily true. but your supposed corollary was > China wasn’t working hard to build their own chips kind of dishonest ?
true_religion 18d ago
I do believe your first sentence, but the second one ... doesn't really follow. The unnatural and sudden nature of the US chip embargo has galvanized the Chinese companies to speed up development. It makes economic sense to do so rather than pay inflated rates to essentially smuggle a necessary good, while never knowing if the embargo will be tightened and those under-the-table supply chains dry up as well. Yes, there was a plan, but what was planned for 5 years from now is being done today, because if you wait 5 years, you'll be so far behind thanks to the effect of the embargo.
- edgyquant 15d ago
  The AI revolution has led to everyone including US companies working to build their own GPUs there is zero proof or reason to think embargo’s are the cause. As I said, China was already working to build their own capacity

menaerus 18d ago

Why do you think the Chinese are not using their ai chips, which afaics are from huawei, to train their models? If that is true, which I think it is, we don't have to wait until 2030 to see if they're gonna match the performance of nvidia GPU. The evidence is already here - glm is among the most competitive models out there.

gpt5 18d ago
Look up reports by The Information, DeepSeek’s training of its big models are all done on NVidia’s chips (more than that - on smuggled Blackwell as well). There have been attempts by many Chinese labs to train on Huawei h chips, but they have all been limited to more minor models or distillations of the bigger ones.
- menaerus 18d ago
  Unless you have the source for the latter it's nothing more than propaganda. Also, DeepSeek report is 2-3 years old, and at that time there were no huawei chips, at least not known to the public. This is a different model, in different age where huawei chips are already delivered into the production as we see
  - gpt5 18d ago
    The Information have reports on this as recent as this summer
    - bigbadfeline 17d ago
      [flagged]
    - menaerus 17d ago
      Do you have a link?

pianopatrick 18d ago

When you say AI will be powerful, what do you mean? Like in terms of national power, will AI let the US fight and win a war against China despite China's size, manufacturing base and possession of nuclear weapons? Will AI let the US beat the Chinese in manufacturing costs and scale despite China's greater adoption of industrial robots and larger number of skilled workers? Or will AI just be really good at writing software? Because if the AI is just really good at writing software, I am not sure why China has to "catch up". Seems to me China can just treat AI like other technologies. Let the US pay most of the R&D costs, then come after and treat the technology as a commodity. Sell it better and cheaper and at scale. I am not sure why it's a big deal for China if China is a few months behind the US in terms of the very frontier AI. Just like I'm not sure if it's a big deal which country has the biggest super computer in the world.

gpt5 18d ago
If AI is super human, it can beat any nation with today’s technology. It can recursively self improve while suppressing any other lab (think about how good it is in hacking computer systems). I am not inventing a winner take it all scenario, that is what driving the race.
- pianopatrick 18d ago
  But, like, how does that smarts lead to beating nations with today's technology? How would an AI stop an incoming nuclear ballistic missile? I've heard on podcasts with MIT professor Ted Postol that based in the laws of physics intercepting these is basically impossible, because of the speeds and physics involved. Can AI discover new physics to overcome those limitations? If AI cannot stop nuclear ballistic missiles, then how does AI give the US power over China? Seems to me that after AI we have the same mutually assured destruction we have today. In which case America cannot really stop China from progressing or threaten China too much. Seems to me being super human intelligent does not inherently guarantee power. Just like the smartest person in the world does not always win in a fist fight or a gun fight or war. I.e. Stephen Hawking might have been smart, but he did not have physical strength and power. Power and smarts are not always related.