Yes, Nazi Germany is a much better comparison to modern China than comparing it to Mao's China or Stalin's Soviet Union because Nazi Germany was an advanced capitalistic economy. — Judaka

And after Mao died, it wasn't an advanced economy. That's the key point. History and where countries start from matter.

Which ties back into, why did the cold war happen in the first place? Why was the US interested in ensuring China did not become communist? It's because the US is an advanced capitalistic economy, they want markets for their goods, communism threatens that. The US got what they wanted and the price China paid was the abandoning of communism. — Judaka

Now there's a revisionist line!

China was Maoist. Period.

The Koumingtang held only to the island of Taiwan (and some remnants of the army were pushed into Burma among other places). That the US wanted and got China to abandon communism reeks to pure American intellectual hubris: to the idea that everything in this World happens because of everybody at all times follow the fiddle played by the evil Uncle Sam and the capitalists behind him.

Perhaps Deng Xiaoping first and foremost reason wasn't the US relations, even if those obviously had improved.

Even if China has socialism, the businesses that are owned by the government are highly competitive and profit-driven, it resembles all the worst parts of capitalism that communism was supposed to do away with. — Judaka

That's the worst parts of capitalism? So you mean they ought to be less competitive in the global market or what?

As you said one of the big fails was giving the rule of West to politicians that were so mediocrities like Bush senior. But what is pretty interesting here is how Russia is still dominant in Europe. — javi2541997

Have the US go back from Europe to eat apple pie and have the EU collapse and Russia is the strongest country in Europe. That's why they are so against the EU and hope that the US goes back to it's Continent.

I wish a EU more connected with Russia or Kremlin but it looks like hard to reach it and each European country can only make business or diplomatic affairs with Russia by their own. — javi2541997

First of all, there is no European singular policy towards Russia. Only a desperate attempt to have one.

For Ukraine, Russia is the drunk guy assaulting it. For especially the Baltic States, but also the former Warsaw Pact Countries, it is the violent drunk ex-husband that you simply cannot stand and you fear that he comes to bang your door and will try to get inside. For countries like Sweden and Finland, it's the difficult neighbor with whom you still get along quite OK and have reasonable relations, even if you have a painful history with him. For Central European countries it's a possible trade partner and so actually so far, that you aren't bothered about it's actions. And for countries like Portugal and Spain, they don't care about Russia at all, especially when you have such problematic neighbors on the North African side of the Mediterranean. And Russia? Oh he thinks that everybody is against him and he has to put it up with these hostile neighbors who are always ganging up against him. After all, there was first Napoleon and then Hitler, so no third time.

Hence with so different starting positions, the EU has big problems to create a coherent Russia policy. This also is a prime example why the EU being the US of Europe simply doesn't work. California and North Dakota don't have any separate and/or own issues about the US policy towards Russia.

- why not? — The Opposite

They have had now since their independence 73 years of insurgency, so go for it!

Yes, now for a revolutionary war where they finally get peace. This time it's different!

Kachin...


Karen...


Shan...


So bring on another rebel army/group to Burma to fight the government in addition to the three above (and others). At least there's support for the war party in PF. At least for a while...

Don't waste my time. If you don't have a logical, philosophical, reasoned response to give, then you can go give an unreasoned, illogical, baboon mating call to some barn animal instead of wasting my time here. — Dharmi

I think nobody will waste their, sorry, your time.

Besides, we might get blinded by the sheer radiance of your vast knowledge, we ignorant mortals. :snicker:

I think far more successful will be the young Americans who so vehemently oppose to everything their country stands for.

Who better to promote communism than those never haven seen or experienced it. :cool:

Why can't the protesters be armed? Better than them being butchered on the streets like they are right now — The Opposite

YES!!! We need an Asian version of the Syrian civil war! Oh wait, do we have already that in Myanmar/Burma???

The Tatmadaw (the armed forces of Myanmar) with over a half a million soldiers will obviously surrender / retreat if the protesters are armed.

And just how long has there been some kind of armed insurrection against the central authority in Burma? Like from it's independence?

No.

And I guess your friend hasn't studied economics.

All proofs of the existence irrational numbers (that I'm aware of) are proofs by contradiction. For example, we assume that √2 can only be 1) a rational number or 2) an irrational number. Since we've proved that √2 is not a rational number we conclude that it's an irrational number. Is it possible that this is a false dichotomy? — Ryan O'Connor

Have we really proved the existence of irrational numbers? That's the name of this thread.

Is this a question people are debating for five pages here??? :snicker:

I think Xi Jinping is failing in some points because he is showing how evident China wants to control the world. — javi2541997

It's still not so evident. The Belt and Road initiative might be compared to a "Marshall Plan", but China isn't building up an alliance to contain the US. A more logical reason for the "Belt and Road" initiative is to do something with the massive industrial base that has been created to build those hundreds of new cities in order to prevent a huge economy recession.

. Nevertheless it is interesting how always they avoid "European market" or the Euro itself. They don't want be part of it. This shows how powerful Russia is despite the fall of socialism/communism in 1991. — javi2541997

Or perhaps once you have been a Superpower, an ordinary "Great Power" status where you still would need to work with your peers as equals simply isn't the thing for you. Putin's Russia thinks it can be a Superpower still and Xi Jingping's China thinks it ought to be a Superpower.

I've always said that there was a brief window of opportunity when Russia could indeed have been open to join the West, but you would have needed larger than life politicians for that to happen. We hadn't them: we had only George Bush senior, Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin, average politicians.

(A fleeing moment in Russian history: The statue of Felix Dzerzinski, the founder of the Soviet secret police, comes down in front of the KGB headquarters as the Soviet Union collapses. Now the prior head of the successor organization of the KGB rules Russia as an autocrat.)

. Deng Xiaoping was clever making this statement. — javi2541997

Exactly.

And just look at the situation from Deng's point of view: When everybody understands what a disaster the Cultural Revolution was (and before that the Great Leap), what can you do as a communist? Saying "This didn't and doesn't work" and disbanding the CCP and perhaps (if before 1975) ask Chiang Kai-Shek come back? Out of the question. The transition to repair the economy and get economic growth going was done without the "Glasnost" and "Perestroika" that Gorbachev tried. And at least here Marx was correct: the economy is most important. Events on Tianamen Square in 1989 showed quite clearly what would happen if the CCP wouldn't get their act together. The Chinese couldn't , as the old Soviet joke went, simply close the curtains on the train and assume that it was going forward when the locomotive had broken down.

And the economic growth has kept the Chinese happy. Not those that had before democracy, the people of Hong Kong, but others. The CCP has successfully gotten the idea through that western type democracy would lead to the collapse of China and create a turmoil. In fact with Xi Jinping we can see that now the CCP is relaxing and thinking they have everything quite well under control and no need for the Western investors anymore. Good time to show what they are really like.

The CCP resembles something like Nazi Germany, an advanced capitalist economy with a totalitarian government. — Judaka

It's typical that you say it resembles Nazi Germany, not that it grew out of something similar to Stalinist Soviet Union, which was close to heart for Mao. The Third Reich emerged from the Weimar Republic, which was capitalist. Modern day China emerged from Maoist China. For some peculiar reason Soviet Union or Marxism-Leninism or the authoritarianism of (Marxist) socialist regimes is all disappeared from the definitions of communism in the 21st Century. How neat.



And then again, the Chinese banged their head on the wall enough to understand that the ideologically pure Marxism-Leninism simply didn't work. Hence these authoritarians eased with the ideological central planning (which was a total disaster) and started to use parts of capitalism and Western investment to shorten the technological gap the West has enjoyed. And I remember those European intellectuals who were totally fascinated with the Cultural Revolution and in "their critique" of the West rejoiced the Revolution and Mao. Still have some books which praise the cultural revolution from the 1970's written by Westerners.

So how dare they!

And as the US is a mixed economy, one could argue also that it's not a free market capitalist economy. Or (ignoring the propaganda) and looking at the policies of the Biden administration. (As Biden surely would be in favour of free markets and capitalism, when asked about it.) To quote again Xi Jinping, there is no orthodox, immutable version of socialism. And it's obvious that they have had to make a change starting with Deng Xiaoping, or continue with the orthodox Maoism and the cultural revolution, which would have resulted in a similar or worse situation as North Korea.

There is theory and ideology and then there is reality. And Chinese economic growth, starting from a situation where the Chinese economy was smaller than the GDP of the Netherlands and then climbing to where it is, isn't a small feat. You can call whatever you want it: authoritarianism, fascism or capitalism, to make some point of a complex issue, yet that doesn't change China. What the people think there country is does matter, both with China or the US.

Simply put it: the socialism of the CCP does matter. You can see this in a variety of things. One example is how the Chinese billionaires have been crushed right from the start if they have said anything critical about China. China surely will not let independent oligarchs rule or influence politics in China.

Not a lot heard about the two cooperating, indeed. — Shawn

Never heard of the BRIC countries?



Or that basically Soviet Union and Russia has been a major arms supplier for China, selling to China it's first aircraft carrier, for example. Only now has China had a wide variety of indigenous arms, yet there are a lot copied from Russian and Western counterparts. Only in the last decade has Chinese domestic military industrial complex come to such quality that imports from Russia have gone down:

I've been surprised by how China and Russia have somewhat cold relations with one another. Although, they plan to go back to the moon soon for scientific reasons. — Shawn

Remember that even the Soviet Union and Communist China had a border conflict in 1969 after the Sino-Soviet Split, starting from things like Mao didn't like that Khrushchev denounced Stalin.

Tensions at the border:


And let's not forget that earlier Russia was one of those Western imperial powers that took chunks of Chinese held lands up until the Russo-Japanese war replaced them in Manchuria and still Russia does hold areas that have been Chinese territory during the Ming dynasty and still in the 19th Century. Those kind of issue do create tensions.



Especially American political commentators are keen on to look at the differences and difficulties that the two countries have, yet I think that their relations are quite OK. Neither of the countries, Russia or China, want to play second fiddle in an alliance, and why upset the US with an alliance? Hence no alliance between them.

What's your take on the West judging whether China is really communist or not? Hilarious or just dumb? — Shawn

We simply don't care what they actually think, if it's not what we think. We judge those that think else than us. And unfortunately, we are getting only worse.

Secondly, China being communist or not is a question like "Is US a free market capitalist country or not?", really. A current question especially after now the US government giving a record breaking handouts to it's citizens and large corporations: many could question the "free market" part, just as people question the "communist" part in China. Yet if people really believe that they are for free market capitalism or for Marxism, they take the ideology close to heart, who to judge them and say they are totally wrong, that they are not what they say they are?

Those policy points are very clearly and unapologetically authoritarian, which is not only completely contrary to the original (libertarian) socialism, but even contrary to the stated end-goal of Marxism, and is the reason why Marxism(-Leninism) consistently fails to actually achieve socialist ends: — Pfhorrest

Perfect.

What you just said is a prime example of this houlier than thou -attitude so plentiful with Western socialists when it comes to ideology. Western social democracy might not be authoritarian, yet a lot of socialism is de facto authoritarian. And Marxism hasn't been so keen on upholding libertarian values.

China is not communist
— Judaka

:100: :up:

China is the epitome of state capitalism. — Pfhorrest

This is simply wrong. It's not.

And I know people here: they don't believe and totally disregard totally those that actually say that they are Marxists and communists... if they are Chinese. In fact, the actual views of the Chinese communists running China are not at all even taken into account and ignored.

Yet if you yourself had experienced Mao's Cultural Revolution, seen how "The Great Leap" failed and seen how the Soviet Union collapsed, you really might think twice before going down that path again. And so have the Chinese communists done. They have had to build their system on that basis and improved their system in reality, not go off into dreaming about a Marxist la-la-land as a way to criticize the Western capitalism here. And they have performed a historical economic growth (even if, well, Taiwan, is more wealthy.)

So let's just look at what the leader of China, Xi Jinping, takes as 14 point policy for Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era:

1. Ensuring Chinese Communist Party leadership over all forms of work in China.
2. The Chinese Communist Party should take a people-centric approach for the public interest.
3. The continuation of "comprehensive deepening of reforms".
4. Adopting new development ideas based on science and for "innovative, coordinated, green, open and shared development".
5. Following "socialism with Chinese characteristics" with "people as the masters of the country".
6. Governing China with the rule of law.
7. "Practise socialist core values", including Marxism-Leninism, Communism and "socialism with Chinese characteristics".
8. "Improving people's livelihood and well-being is the primary goal of development".
9. Coexist well with nature with "energy conservation and environmental protection" policies and "contribute to global ecological safety".
10. Strengthen national security.
11. The Chinese Communist Party should have "absolute leadership over" China's People's Liberation Army.
12. Promoting the one country, two systems system for Hong Kong and Macau with a future of "complete national reunification"; and to follow the One-China policy and 1992 Consensus for Taiwan.
13. Establish a common destiny between Chinese people and other people around the world with a "peaceful international environment".
14. Improve party discipline in the Chinese Communist Party.

From a speech from Xi Jinping comes clear the attitude of these Marxists:

Scientific socialism is not an immutable dogma. I once said that China’s great social transformation is not a masterplate from which we simply continue our history and culture, nor a pattern from which we mechanically apply the ideas of classic Marxist authors, nor a reprint of the practice of socialism in other countries, nor a duplicate of modernization from abroad. There is no orthodox, immutable version of socialism. It is only by closely linking the basic principles of scientific socialism with a country’s specific realities, history, cultural traditions, and contemporary needs, and by continually conducting inquiries and reviews in the practice of socialism, that a blueprint can become a bright reality.

What works is used, basically. And there is no immutable version of socialism. Hence the totalitarian system evolves. And many non-democratic nations can indeed look to China for an example to copy.

Hence it's basically quite ignorant (and arrogant) to say that China isn't socialist. I think that these people, members of the CCP, genuinely believe that they are socialists and for some Westerners to refute that is simply Western hubris.

How so? Interested to hear your argument.

Not at all. Naturalism is a caricature, a non-position. — Dharmi

Really?

Either you ignore or simply dislike Quine.

Rationalism and empiricism. Hmm.

Would naturalism be close to that? The definition of naturalism is something like: the philosophical belief that everything arises from natural properties and causes, and supernatural or spiritual explanations don't matter. At least naturalism uses extensively empiricism in the way of using the scientific method and using empirical study.

Perhaps the writings of Quine would be something that is looking for.

I still don't totally understand why this is. I think it's because it leads to a state of equilibrium between wages and prices so that profit margins become small. Workers are then laid off to try to increase profitability and invite investment for R+D, new facilities and equipment, etc, but that only lowers demand. Now inventory becomes bloated. More workers are laid off. Is this right? — frank

It's not that simple even in a small economy.

It's obvious here and in for example Sweden.

What it comes down to is that the Nordic system leads to centralization where there are central trade union organizations and a central employer union that decide wage increases, which favors the larger companies and corporations and don't look at how bureaucratic and burdensome the whole system comes to be from a perspective of the small firm or entrepreneur. This kind of corporatism leads to an environment which favors large companies and makes it more difficult for smaller firms. It simply comes down to the ease of negotiation: it's easier to negotiate with the 10 largest corporations than 100 000 entrepreneurs, even if the entrepreneurs are far more important to the economy than the 10 largest companies. Also companies that are working in a booming industry where there is huge demand and little supply of trained specialists, the system prohibits luring people with huge salaries. Brain drain to other countries can happen. Also the system increases red tape and as there are many things in place to protect the employee, it also makes the whole issue far more difficult than in let's say the US. Or especially in China.

Hiring employees can become a huge obstacle: If the employee gets an 100 euro salary, the employer has to pay basically 140 euros in all. If you can buy the service for less than 140 euros, then you have a dilemma. After all, hiring an employee or buying the service from an outside company are the two options and just as you don't have any obligations towards your grocery market (other than to pay what you buy) neither has the company for a service bought. Also a welfare state really does make people think twice before going into a low salary job: if your net income goes only barely increases if you take a low paying job and you then you haven't much spare time anymore, it really is a question. Many do alienate from the society and never hold a job. This causes low self esteem and true apathy. Republican politicians can exaggerate this problem, yet the issue is real if not at all comparable to the problems what a non-existent welfare can produce.

You can easily observe that there are always pros and cons in these issues and people can abuse a system, any system there is. And this makes economics and sociology so complex that these issues cannot really be put into a simple math formula in their entirety. Nuances are important.

Partly yes.

In a way, governments have lost their power or simply pushed forward an agenda of the most wealthy and corporations. That has happened.

Basically money and investment, capital, was given freedom to cross borders and nobody thought what would happen to labor. I think that there's ample examples of that in the US. Add there that more and more production and even services are done by machines.

Let's take one example: the role of trade unions.

Strong labor unions and government control can indeed lead to a more stagnant economy, yet if trade unions are not powerful and basically unimportant, then what can emerge is totally reckless behavior from the employer side. This can create far larger problems than the negative aspects of a heavily unionized workforce can produce. Sweden has a labor union participation rate of 82% and Finland and Denmark of 76% while with the US this is at 13%. What is missing from this from the below map is Iceland, which has the highest level of the work force participating in labor unions:



Then lets look at the gini coefficient by country, which measures income inequality. Again in very close order the listing of the countries: the least inequal countries have the highest labor union participation rates.



And where do we find the countries when relative povetry is measured? Again far less relative povetry in countries with higher union participation.



Labor unions can also have harmful policies: they can promote trade barriers that make industries totally incapable of competing with other nations in the long run. Or simply be taken over by organized crime. And do note that this isn't a leftist issue: trade unions do not mean that these unions would be made of people on the political left.

Yet the basic simple fact is that workers get a better deal when haggling over salaries on a collective level than as individual workers. And this ought to be totally fine for liberals/libertarians too. But for some, it isn't so.

But neoliberalism became a sort of social virus that reorganized America and to some extent the world to think of health only in terms of the health of Wall Street. The doctrine is to let Main Street disintegrate as long as Wall St. is ok. — frank

Free market works better than a command economy, yet for a free market to operate healthily needs a lot more is needed than the Ayn Randian libertarian just assumes to be. Simply put it: A society isn't based on competition, but on a community.

I think the basic reason is that the present elite doesn't feel that they have a responsibility towards the larger society and they have no understanding that they should take care that there exists social cohesion in the society.

Here it's important to understand what actually social cohesion is about. Here's a definition:

Social cohesion refers to the extent of connectedness and solidarity among groups in society. It identifies two main dimensions: the sense of belonging of a community and the relationships among members within the community itself. It stems from a democratic effort to establish social balance, economic dynamism, and national identity, with the goals of founding a system of equity, sustaining the impulses of uncontrolled economic growth, and avoiding social fractures.

Social cohesion is a social process which aims to consolidate plurality of citizenship by reducing inequality and socioeconomic disparities and fractures in the society.

Political polarization, social and economic inequality reduces social cohesion and in the end creates violence, distrust and fear throughout the society. And if the elite just stands by, then the train wreck happens. The elite can withdraw to it's guarded communities or simply move to safer places abroad and then bemoan how bad things have gotten in their country and how much nicer it was decades ago without ever understanding that their lack of action was very crucial in the collapse.

When inequality between the rich and the poor is widespread and rampant, better to have serious disunity among the masses. That's the scheme of the ruling class I guess.

Indeed it's worth mentioning what a global endeavor mathematics has been and try to make the subject interesting for students by relating it to their life. Some of the proponents of "non-European oriented math & science" do emphasis this and I don't find anything wrong in their ideas.

However I fear that the chosen rhetoric has a quite different agenda. To talk about toxic white supremacy and racism in mathematics is a deliberate and open attack especially in the US. To object or to criticize what is said then of course is "upholding toxic white supremacy" and racism. And basically I find it quite racist to divide students like this by race as obviously from the minorities mentioned (Black, Latinx, multilingual) Asians are excluded and native Americans forgotten (as many times happens).

And from a philosophical view, the following idea that is promoted seems bizarre:

White supremacy culture shows up in math classrooms when...

The focus is on getting the “right” answer.

Instead...

The concept of mathematics being purely objective is unequivocally false, and teaching it is even much less so. Upholding the idea that there are always right and wrong answers perpetuate objectivity as well as fear of open conflict.

How this is unequivocally false and "white supremacist" goes over my head when you think about the foundations of mathematics. And what open conflict is being talked here? Perhaps I think too much that mathematics is linked to logic or set theory. For me, mathematics is different from other sciences...especially from humanities and social sciences. It is rigorous and logical and mathematical statements are either true or false, even if there are obvious limitations on what we can prove to be true or false. There can be various other logical systems used, of course, yet they then follow their own rules (and is something not being taught at schools). I don't think that there is real insight behind these ideas, because the writers of the pamphlet continue with the following line:

Of course, most math problems have correct answers, but sometimes there can be more than one way to interpret a problem, especially word problems, leading to more than one possible right answer.

Sometimes. Yet in my view an interpretation of a problem in various ways isn't actually math.

Thank you for giving the references. Still a bit strange, I have to say. 100 years is such a brief period of time in international relations.

Here's what the American Foreign Policy -magazine says about this:

some Turkish pundits are looking ahead to more serious foreign-policy challenges — like what will happen in 2023 when the Treaty of Lausanne expires and Turkey’s modern borders become obsolete. In keeping with secret articles signed by Turkish and British diplomats at a Swiss lakefront resort almost a century ago, British troops will reoccupy forts along the Bosphorus, and the Greek Orthodox patriarch will resurrect a Byzantine ministate within Istanbul’s city walls. On the plus side for Turkey, the country will finally be allowed to tap its vast, previously off-limits oil reserves and perhaps regain Western Thrace. So there’s that.

Of course, none of this will actually happen. The Treaty of Lausanne has no secret expiration clause. But it’s instructive to consider what these conspiracy theories, trafficked on semi-obscure websites and second-rate news shows, reveal about the deeper realities of Turkish foreign policy, especially under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s pro-Islam Justice and Development Party (AKP).

After defeating the Ottoman Empire in World War I, Britain, France, Italy, and Greece divided Anatolia, colonizing the territory that is now Turkey. However, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk reorganized the remnants of the Ottoman army and thwarted this attempted division through shrewd diplomacy and several years of war. Subsequently, the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne recognized Ataturk’s victory and established the borders of modern Turkey. Lausanne then became part of the country’s foundational myth. For a time it even had its own holiday, Lausanne Day, when children dressed in costumes representing contested regions of Anatolia for elementary school plays.

With the Treaty of Lausanne so embedded in the Turkish state’s ideology, it is no surprise that conspiracies about it are ideologically loaded and vary according to the partisan affiliation of the individual conspiracy-monger. Erdogan’s critics tend to be more focused on the risks Turkey faces when Lausanne expires. Conspiracy-minded secularists have always worried that Erdogan is working with the European Union to establish an independent Kurdistan or perhaps dig a new Bosphorus to secure American ships’ access to the Black Sea, or really doing anything else possible to undermine the sovereignty Ataturk secured for Turkey. Some of Erdogan’s supporters, by contrast, are more optimistic about Lausanne’s expiration, in part based on a strain of recent historical revisionism suggesting that Ataturk actually could have gotten a much better deal during the negotiations had he not been in league with the Europeans — not preserved the whole Ottoman Empire, necessarily, but at least held on to a bit more of Greek Thrace and maybe the oil fields of Mosul. Where Ataturk once criticized the Ottoman sultan for failing to defend Turkish territory in the face of Western aggression, Islamists have now borrowed this charge for use against Ataturk.

In the realm of Turkish domestic politics, talk about “the end of Lausanne” reflects the fears of some and the hopes of others that with former prime minister, now president, Erdogan’s consolidation of power over the last decade, Turkey has embarked on a second republic — what Erdogan calls “New Turkey.” Supporters believe this new incarnation of the Turkish state will be free of the authoritarianism that defined Ataturk’s republic; critics worry it will be bereft of Ataturk’s secularism.

Still, the persistence of the end-of-Lausanne myth shows the extent to which New Turkey will be indebted to the ideology of the old one. Turkish Islamists have certainly inherited the conspiratorial nationalism found among many secularists, complete with the suspicion of Euro-American invasions and Christian-Zionist plots. (Is it any coincidence Lausanne is in Switzerland, a center of world Zionism?) While the secularist fringe speculated that Erdogan was a secret Jew using moderate Islam to weaken Turkey on Israel’s orders, many in the AKP’s camp now imagine that all Erdogan’s problems are caused by various international conspiracies seeking to block Turkey’s meteoric rise.

In the realm of foreign policy, though, these conspiracies belie a deeper truth: Despite the current violence to Turkey’s south, the borders enshrined in the Treaty of Lausanne are more secure than they have ever been. And the AKP was the first government to fully realize this. While Erdogan has often stoked nationalist paranoia for political gain, as when he claimed foreign powers were behind popular anti-government protests, the AKP’s foreign policy was the first to reflect a serious awareness of Turkey’s newfound political and economic power, not to mention the security that comes with it. Beneath all the bizarre rhetoric and paranoia, the AKP realized that Turkey has finally moved beyond an era in its foreign policy defined by the need to defend what was won at Lausanne.

See article Notes on a Turkish Conspiracy in Foreign Policy, 2017.

Just to continue this thread from last year and to show how this kind of thinking and "decolonizing" of science has gone forward and is going forward. In Oregon, it seems that they are fighting rampant racism and white supremacy culture in math.

White supremacy culture infiltrates math classrooms in everyday teacher actions. Coupled with the beliefs that underlie these actions, they perpetuate educational harm on Black, Latinx, and multilingual students, denying them full access to the world of mathematics. - We see white supremacy culture show up in the mathematics classroom even as we carry out our professional responsibilities outlined in the California Standards for the Teaching Profession (CSTP). Using CSTPas a framework, we see white supremacy culture in the mathematics classroom can show up when:

• The focus is on getting the “right” answer.
• Independent practice is valued over teamwork or collaboration.
• “Real-world math” is valued over math in the real world.
• Students are tracked (into courses/pathways and within the classroom).
• Participation structures reinforce dominant ways of being.
• Teachers enculturated in the USA teach mathematics the way they learned it.
• Expectations are not met.
• Addressing mistakes.
• Teachers are teachers and students are learners.

And it goes on... If the above is "white supremacy culture", as it is claimed, this will not be tolerated. Now to design a culturally sustaining math space or to promote to ethnomathematics might be something refreshing and new like "Intentionally integrate physical movement in math classes", but that issues above like "addressing mistakes" are seen as evidence of white supremacy, I'm not so sure where this will lead. Above all when the issue is something like mathematics and not art history.

But I urge everyone to look at A Pathway to Equitable Math Instruction Dismantling Racism in Mathematics Instruction -Exercises for educators to reflect on their own biases to transform their instructional practice . This is promoted by the Oregon Department of Education (see here)

As the pamphlet states:

Teachers should use this workbook to self-reflect on individual practices in the classroom and identify next steps in their antiracist journey as a math educator.

Forward with the new glorious education of math!!!

By international law, every treaty expires after 100 years of use. — Franz Liszt

Every treaty? I've never heard of this. Please give a reference or link if this is true. You see, a lot of treaties would be expiring otherwise (the Geneva conventions, peace treaties etc).

It's very unlikely that these two NATO countries (Yes, Turkey is still in NATO) will go to all out war. What they could do is have a low-level conflict where tensions get high and both sides engage in a diplomatic fight and show their military muscles. Likely in this kind of "conflict" asymmetric "warfare" is used. The use of proxies (naturally the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus). Even with the case of Cyprus, one should note that the island state is member of the EU. Turkey successfully invading the Republic of Cyprus would likely have huge trade and political consequences for the country. It simply is a bad idea. Yet border disputes or disputes over maritime economic zone could happen (and do exist now). Again these kind of disputes wouldn't likely just escalate out of control. There is still ample amount of intelligence both in Turkey and in Greece to keep any quarrel contained. It would be different if Turkey wouldn't be a member of NATO and for example allied with Iran or Russia.

The asymmetric way to push your agenda would be more likely to happen. We've already seen this when Erdogan opened up their side of the border again for refugees and the Greek government closed the borders (just prior to the pandemic last year). The EU stood with Greece then and likely, finally, has learned how to respond to this kind of asymmetric pressure.

(Pawns in the game. Photo from March last year.)


Of course these tensions aren't a new one. The invasion of Cyprus happened in the summer of 1974. Even this short documentary below about the Greek-Turkish tensions is from 2019, two years ago (if this conflict is totally new thing to people):

It looks like the East has given up its introverted nature and is now in the process of copying a Western mindset. This is a shame because as we all know "innerspace" is as mysterious and unexplored as is outerspace and should deserve at the very least equal if not more attention. — TheMadFool

At least when it comes to the exploration of Mars, I think it's great that "the East" has copied the West and created very interesting Space programs.

With less than the amount of money put into the 2013 blockbuster "Gravity", India launched an Mars orbiter the same year. The UAE reached Mars with it's own Emirates Mars Mission that was earlier launched from Japan. One of objectives of the Mars mission was to "educate and inspire the younger generations", i.e. to get more engineering and science done in the oil producing country.

From humble beginnings in 1963:



The fact is that especially space programs and space research might still be thought as a "vanity" project and useless waste of money. This attitude still resonates. Best example is of course the UK, which cancelled it's small space program (and afterwards launched the fully functioning satellite, because why not) because it was "too costly" and thus France reaped the profits of the commercial satellite boom in Europe. In fact investing in space research and technology has been one of the most profitable things to do: the extremes of space have meant that the technology has been pushed to the limit, something that otherwise hasn't been important with tech when you can have trade barriers to "protect" your industries.

The east, especially the Muslim World, has for too long been away from the scientific research realm.

I don't know which party is more hypocritical here. Starting from W Bush and the Saudi role in 9/11, which was back then a big issue for the Republicans.

Saudi-US alliance is something like if United States and Russia would be allies: would make strategic sense (nobody would dare to oppose that superior tag-team on the World stage), yet the alliance would create constant bitching the US backing non-democratic Russia and Russians getting irritated of US involvement. Both countries would likely be annoyed by the "unholy" alliance, even if it would make strategic sense...if such alliance could have been created after the Cold War (a possibility, but would have needed larger than life politicians to do that).

In similar fashion the US-Saudi relationship gives the US a huge position in the Middle East, especially when Iraq and Syria have collapsed and Egypt is in turmoil. If the relations goes sour and Saudi Arabia seeks security guarantees from China and Russia, then the trainwreck that is called US Middle East policy would be final. And then the final ally left would be Israel.

But that's how US alliances end: they end either with a revolution (example: Iran) or with just a souring of the relations with finally both sides not bothering to think about the relationship anymore (Pakistan).

You ask the kids on campus what's wrong with society and they sace racism. They never notice the class issues, that the global elite are sucking all of the wealth of the nation and destroying the middle and working classes. — fishfry

Isn't that the objective here? Class or what was the slogan..."We are the 99%" would be far too unifying.

Wokestan vs Magastan works for the elites very well. Divide et Impera.

Corruption?

Actually might be just the always irritating realpolitik of the Saudi-US alliance, that still is important. Or would it be better that the relations went the way of one former US ally, Pakistan? Or like with another one, once heralded as the other "Twin-Pillars" ally of the US, Iran? Americans would so much love to hate the Saudis.




(Above an actual re-enactment of the old meeting, done in February 2020 by US and Saudi officials)

Switch a few words and it's the Thirty Years War. — Count Timothy von Icarus

:up:

Agendas and objectives matter.

What should we do about North Korea? — David Solman

Face reality.

Just leave it as it is. You cannot do anything anymore (and luckily, didn't do anything before either). And simply stop being in panic about it.



North Korea has a nuclear deterrent and hence the US has a similar cold war situation with the poor country as you had with the Soviet Union (and basically still have with Russia). End of story. Forget ideas of interfering in their politics or "liberating" the country. Besides, they know they cannot win a war against South Korea and the US.

Actual peace deal would be nice, because the US just has an armistice with North Korea.

I'll ask again. Please explain in what way calling racial conditions in the US a war makes a solution to those issues easier or more likely. — T Clark

If your title would be the "national race and ethnicity writer for The Associated Press", would your objective be to provide solutions race relations or to show that serious racial problems exist in the US and that they matter?

Well, what is the difference between modernity and modernism? — TheHedoMinimalist

Modernity is the present that we live in, it's a historical period of time. Modernism can be said to be a philosophical movement and can be understood in many ways, starting from an art style to being a broader societal view. Hence many of those philosophers are more likely to be critical of modernism rather than of modernity, starting with the post-modernists.

I think many times the clash happens when the so-called "modernist" solution, or what is viewed to be a "modernist" solution to some problem, which likely is the rather pragmatic, technocratic (that the solution is to use technology, science and experts) or free market oriented (let the market mechanism solve the problem) solution to a complex problem, which then the "anti-modernist" doesn't like (and likely sees a political power play in the modernist solution).

In contrast, it seems like there are plenty of people like me that just don’t have any problem with modernity whatsoever. Given this, I tend to think that maybe we should give modernity more credit and maybe we should be more modest in our criticism of modern life. — TheHedoMinimalist

Perhaps it should be noted that modernity and modernism are two different things.

And of course, improvements happen when we aren't happy and/or satisfied with the things we have. Philosophers naturally see things to be corrected at our present society, in the one that they live in. It is a thing that is crucial for modernity, actually. How useful and beneficial their input truly is, is another question.

I just had to say that I much prefer, and only drive, old cars - as little technology as possible! — Photios

I remember this professor of economic history who preferred cars manufactured earlier than one specific year in the 1970's. That was the year when the first crude computers and electronic gadgets were introduced to cars. With cars before that year he could repair himself everything. (Which of course today would be a horrible blasphemy for car manufacturers...if people could do that.)

Likely he will be treated as a hero at least by the CPAC crowd, I forecast.



So much for the GOP having a sincere look at what went wrong with the 2020 elections (and with the Trump Presidency).

Now that COVID-19 is coming to an end — Shawn

You mean when? End of this year? Maybe that third wave at least in Europe still? Let's hope you are correct.

and new economic trends are arising — Shawn

Let's see what they are… besides a rampant speculative bubble in the markets thanks to asset inflation.

what will likely happen in the near future due to these tendencies in the economy arising and being enhanced by further more intelligent AI. — Shawn

Let's start from the beginning.

The deflationary impact of technology and price competition isn't anything new.

This happens especially when some technology is rather new and basically just "taking off" with rapid advancements being made througout the young industry. Yet this also happens in areas where the technology isn't going forward in such rapid pace too. Just compare, just for example, modern cars of this year and compare them with cars 50 years go (from 1971). Then compare those cars from 1971 to those of fifty years earlier in 1921. In both examples the features of the most luxurious and "high tech" cars of the earlier era have become totally normal in your average cheap family cars of the later era. And likely the tech has surpassed them making the newer cars far easier to drive and far more comfortable and safe.

Ford Fiesta 2021:

Ford Taunus 1971:

Ford T 1921:


In fact, just to start or drive a Ford T-model from 1921 and change it's gears would be extremely difficult for a modern ordinary driver without any instructions. Yet I would make one important question here:

Is this truly a "deflationary" aspect of technological advance? Is to correct to call it "deflationary"?

Or is there still the basic utility behind the product, be it a car or something else, that has stayed the same? Driving to work with either a 2021 Ford or a 1971 Ford or even with the 1921 Ford is still the same thing: you drive a car to work. This is an important question as the "deflationary" aspect of technological advance is statistically used to lower inflation: your 2021 Ford Fiesta is so much better than 1971 that the statistician can argue that inflation hasn't been as great as the prices of 1971 and this year would tell you.

So, what are your thoughts? — Shawn

I think it's a way to hide inflation and distract people from the reality: to say that since your gadgets are so much more awesome now than yesteryear, hence inflation hasn't been so high. And better yet: you have "deflation" when the prices are down and the gadgets are more cooler! For the central bankers and the upholders of the fiat monetary system this is important. It serves them well, especially during a time when income inequality is going through the roof.

And just for those that are interested: a Model-T Ford cost 325$ in 1921. I don't know how much a Ford Taunus (manufactured in Germany) cost in 1971, but your average car cost then perhaps about 3500$. Ford Fiesta costs something like 15 000$, which is way more than just 3500$ in 1971 money calculated by CPI to present money (which would be like 9 000$). So to make the case for there being less inflation, you make the argument that your Ford Fiesta of today is so much better than the Ford Taunus of 1971.