There’s an interesting interview with “Rebel Scientist” Freeman Dyson over at TCS (the longer version of it is here). Desi angle? I particularly liked this blurb where he points out the similarities between the technological mood of India / China today and an emergent US of the 1930’s –
…the western academic world is very much like Weimar Germany, finding itself in a situation of losing power and influence. Fortunately, the countries that matter now are China and India, and the Chinese and Indian experts do not share the mood of doom and gloom. It is amusing to see China and India take on today the role that America took in the nineteen-thirties, still believing in technology as the key to a better life for everyone.
Now, when Dyson speaks of a “western academic world” that’s losing power and influence, it’s really one specific Old Skool corner that brashly found the answer to man’s Tragedy in more / bigger / cooler tech . In its stead, there’s no shortage of academic influence amongst the segment that’s apt to equate economic growth with Global Warming / Consumerism / Corporate Tyranny and that finds the answer not in exuberance but in restraint. Luckily, it appears that message doesn’t sell so well in India.
Not sure that’s fair to Western academia. Of course the humanities & social sciences are dominated by Marxists without much of value to offer. But among professors in engineering/applied science, I see an awareness of constraints (i.e. finite supplies of fossil fuels, global warming)and a drive to innovate around them rather than restraint or antipathy towards globalization. Furthermore, I don’t see anything praiseworthy about Indian academia. There are schools that turn out excellent undergrads but I don’t see any emergent world class research institutes. The Chinese on the other hand have a plan and are luring back home many young brilliant post docs from the best American universities
I have five different theories on what he could mean by that. He didn’t elaborate on it very much in the interview. so…IS technology the key to a better life for everyone or isn’t it given the fact it led to the West’s “gloom and doom” approach, as he says? And what’s so amusing about it if we can manage to progress with optimism “despite” a religious environment?
Yes, the western academic world is very much like Weimar Germany, finding itself in a situation of losing power and influence.
Hmmm…
US Nobel Prize-winners in the sciences in 2006: 6
Chinese Nobel Prize-winners in the sciences ever: 3 (all Chinese-Americans; years won: 1957, 1957, 1998)
Indian Nobel Prize-winners in the sciences ever: 4 (1930, 1968, 1983, 1998; ’68 and ’98 were Indian-Americans, ’98 did much of his work in the UK and US).
The West is dead meat!
Interesting article, Vinod, thanks for the link. I have always admired Dyson and his general iconoclasm. He has also always had a soft corner for India, often arguing that the contribution of Indian scientists, physicists in particular, has been undervalued by Westerners. I was extremely surprized, however, to find that he would lay the blame for the current gloominess among scientists and academics on their post-Thatcher angst, and I was even more surprized to find Dyson in the ‘global warming skeptics’ camp, especially when the skepticism appears based on the ‘inadequacy (severe over-fitting) of the climate prediction models’ argument – this is a valid criticism, but global warming is also an empirically observed fact. For example, see the IPCC document “Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis (A Summary for Policymakers)“
Excerpt (page 4):
One can argue, and many people still do, about the causes of this. But to argue that the models are inadequate when the empirical proof is at hand is a little specious, to me. At best, you can say that their predictions for what might happen many decades from now could be way off, but they are being continuously (and iteratively) refined, and as a techno-optimist, it would be more consistent to believe that they will give us the right answers, eventually!
Incidentally, the Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is a US-trained Indian, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri.
Vinod,
In response to your post on Freeman Dyson, Technology, Growth, Development, “Quality of life” and “Environmental Crisis” I want to post a part from my article which examines the impact of Speed, Overstimulation, Consumerism and Industrialization on our minds and environment. Please read.
The link between Mind and Social / Environmental-Issues.
The fast-paced, consumerist lifestyle of Industrial Society is causing exponential rise in psychological problems besides destroying the environment. All issues are interlinked. Our Minds cannot be peaceful when attention-spans are down to nanoseconds, microseconds and milliseconds. Our Minds cannot be peaceful if we destroy Nature.
Industrial Society Destroys Mind and Environment.
Subject : In a fast society slow emotions become extinct. Subject : A thinking mind cannot feel. Subject : Scientific/ Industrial/ Financial thinking destroys the planet. Subject : Environment can never be saved as long as cities exist.
Emotion is what we experience during gaps in our thinking.
If there are no gaps there is no emotion.
Today people are thinking all the time and are mistaking thought (words/ language) for emotion.
When society switches-over from physical work (agriculture) to mental work (scientific/ industrial/ financial/ fast visuals/ fast words ) the speed of thinking keeps on accelerating and the gaps between thinking go on decreasing.
There comes a time when there are almost no gaps.
People become incapable of experiencing/ tolerating gaps.
Emotion ends.
Man becomes machine.
A society that speeds up mentally experiences every mental slowing-down as Depression / Anxiety.
A ( travelling )society that speeds up physically experiences every physical slowing-down as Depression / Anxiety.
A society that entertains itself daily experiences every non-entertaining moment as Depression / Anxiety.
Fast visuals/ words make slow emotions extinct.
Scientific/ Industrial/ Financial thinking destroys emotional circuits.
A fast (large) society cannot feel pain / remorse / empathy.
A fast (large) society will always be cruel to Animals/ Trees/ Air/ Water/ Land and to Itself.
To read the complete article please follow any of these links :
http://www.planetsave.com/ps_mambo/option,com_simpleboard/Itemid,75/func,view/id,68/catid,6/
http://www.freeinfosociety.com/wforum/viewtopic.php?t=3649
http://www.ephilosopher.com/bb-topic-244.html
sushil_yadav
“if there are no gaps..there is no emotion…”
Good stuff, I like it. Preach on Sushil
Our Minds cannot be peaceful when attention-spans are down to nanoseconds, microseconds and milliseconds.
Sushil, that’s what pot is for!
Sushil,
I agree with (almost) everything you said (in the links). This is not too far removed from Vivekananda’s works.
However, it is very important to limit practicing and preaching these ideas at an individual level. What Western academics are doing is to use these ideas to influence politicians who will force change through State power (ala Gore). That would be a disaster for the economy, and hence China and India are (rightly) rejecting that approach.
M. Nam
There is no doubt that economic growth of the past 100 years have lifted the standards of living of hundreds of millions of Americans. One of the reasons this has been possible has been enormous natural resources and size of the North American landmass vs. the size of the population.
“Academics”, as you say, have been aware of the externalities for a long time. Whether it is air, water, or dead zones in the ocean — costs that were easy to overlook over the past 100 years are suddenly looking large.
India and China, although rapidly industrializing and similarly lifting millions out of poverty are doing so at enormous social costs. Unlike America, where these costs took decades to become obvious, Chinese and Indians are paying them now. China has the most polluted cities in the world. In my recent visits to Indian cities, the pollution on certain days was equivalent in density to a light snow. Unbearable. My Chinese friends tell me the same stories of hacking up black phlegm after a few days.
It is only a matter of time before incidences of cancer, birth defects, and other diseases begin to rise to unprecedented levels. Lastly, as the Chinese generate the majority of their power through coal, we in the rest of the world will pay through a faster rise in global temperatures.
You are incorrect in suggesting that the choices are exuberant growth or restraint. There is a middle ground — and that is of thoughtful growth with deliberate consideration of externalities. Unfortunately, it is unlikely that India and China will go down this path.
@Moornam, Comment #8: What sort of disaster do you foresee for the economy if State power is exercised in this case?
We live in an economic world where profits are privatized and large losses are socialized. It is in a state’s best interest to recognize this and hold private industry accountable in order to minimize future costs.
Externalities: >>profits are privatized and large losses are socialized.
Like FannieMae or LongTermCapital? I’m against that as well. Losses should be privatized.
As far as environmental degradation is concerned, you suggest: thoughtful growth with deliberate consideration of externalities.
The problem, as usual is: Who provides the “thoughtful” growth benchmarks and who “considers” externalities? Answer: Government bureaucrats. We know how that worked out in the Soviet Union.
M. Nam
Conceptually, Dyson may be on to something about emerging reticence in some of the western world while so-called 3rd world countries seem poised to surge (don’t know if I agree about academics). For all the religious overbearing, at least in India religiosity keeps clear of scientific reason. People almost instinctively get that without education that includes sciences, there is no out from crappy life. Whereas in the USA you have panchayat level govt bodies deciding evolution is suspect on basis of lightly veiled religious grounds. The people I’ve talked to in India about US creationism can’t help but laugh at what they consider ‘rich, stupid people’.
As Externalitites suggested, the world is paying for the results of the industrial revolution and the dev model set up on top of it, while a few nations prospered from it. The unfortunate thing is – ignoring so much data and knowledge, India and China seem to show little innovation in their development models to account for the difference in scale, population, timing (late in the game vs. leaders in the industrial revolution), environment, availability of resources etc., between themselves and say, the USA which has a small population to a very large, printine land mass in a time of little environmental pollution.
The economic development in India and China needs to care for people, legacy-issues (Nandigram, anyone?), sustainability, and management of natural resources. Don’t know about China, but in India, a vision that sees even as far as 50 yrs is completely missing. Discussion on quality of life issues is missing. And a focus on ‘doing things the right way’ is completely missing.
Sorry – meant to say “…the USA which had a small population to a very large, pristine land mass in a time of little environmental pollution.”
The Soviet Union was pre-internet. Could that form of government ever exist in our wired world?
Someone pinch this guy while he his thinking of how to make this pile of baloney look like an intelligent thesis.
Wow. So the implication is that America doesn’t believe in technology for bettering people’s lives anymore?? I’m sorry. That’s just crap. It’s funny that I read this right after going to a conference concerning a very specific technology (nanotechnology) with an audience full of people from academics, industry, government, and of course some venture capitalists were in the crowd too. Guess what? They all want to advance this technology to better people’s lives – this conference was specifically about medical applications. (I know nano is ‘hot’ right now, but I don’t think this kind of exuberance is unique to just this area of research/technology either.)
And I love India and it’s making incredible progress, but I agree with louicypher in comment@1:
…….
KarmaByte: Agreed.
India does not have the luxury to worry about climate change. Climate change is a concern that can come with full stomach. It would be unfair of the western nations to ask India (and China) to control green house gases, while a large portion citizens live in poverty. – Average american family uses more water in a day than an entire family in middle class India would for a week. – Fat people in west drive trucks to their desk jobs, where as if that truck is used in India it would feed a family.
Just because it is sexy and trendy in Hollywood to talk about Global warming, it does not change the economic reality of developing nations.
Dont get me wrong, I am not one of those Global warming deniers. Far from it. Infact India has already seen the effects of climate change which has caused a part of Sundarbans to submerge. – My point is that while tackling green house gases, it must be done in a way the does not hinder economic progress in developing countries. – BEEF causes more global warming than Cars. I dont see these trendy hollywood people giving up BEEF.
Here’s the Sunderbans submerging due to global warming story.
Not sure who said this in the thread, but I can’t imagine a more dangerous pov. Check this out from yesterday’s Hindu: “Climate Change will Devastate India”. Yes, a little alarmist in the headline, and it’s a leaked report which may get watered down before being released, but even if it turns out to be wrong quantitatively, there is little doubt about the direction of the qualitative change India is likely to have to deal with. India does need to change the energy-intensiveness, (and even more, the emissions-intensiveness) of its development strategy, and to some extent it is doing so (inadvertently) with the emphasis on ICT and biotech instead of old-coal-steel-and-chemicals-based manufacturing, but it needs now to do so more consciously and emphatically.
Also, I don’t agree with Seeker (or Dyson) that the US (or the Euro-zone for that matter) has stopped believing in technological progress – rather, in spite of everything, (budgetary deficits on the one hand or the political strength of religious conservatives on the other), many ambitious technological initiatives are being funded, and funded well – the Nano Initiative already mentioned, any number of bio and energy initiatives, aerospace, quantum computing, anything that looks remotely promising. Really ‘wild’ schemes have also been checked out for climate change mitigation, including cooling the earth through space-borne mirrors which would reflect incoming solar radiation – presumably to be acted on if the earth gets too hot to be saved merely by decreasing the emissions-intensive activities. It’s another matter to ask if these initiatives, including nano, will actually work out as anticipated or create new issues to be dealt with, but the techno-belief itself is not gone from the US decision-making elite. Political posturing and rhetoric is not always the best guide to what is actually happening on the ground.
Unfortunately most material on climate change is ALARMIST and as a result the following it has generated a bit FADish. India being resource strapped cant invest in high tech energy solutions as those tend to be more expensive, while electric power supply is almost luxury in many parts of India.
Who are these sensationalist Hollywood people to say whether or not some Indian in some rural area should get electricity or not? This is a FAD here, it will go away when the next big thing comes. MARK my words. Nobody will be talking about Global Warming in 2009 (except real environmentalists and scientist who really care about the subject and usually are not alarmist)
This should be appropriately labelled a religious belief.
Chachaji, good points and well put.
MoorNam. First, read the definition of externality. Environmental degradation is one. While at it, maybe look up the prisoner’s dilemma. Secondly, stop hyperventilating about the Soviet Union and channelling your internal Hayek. Not all market interventions to combat externalities point to “The Road to Serfdom”. This was said by the author of the aforementioned book himself. Next, stop misrepresenting Gore’s position vis-a-vis the third world. It is a recognized fact that most of the accumulated Carbon Dioxide is due to the industrialized nations. Gore advocates Cap-and-Trade and Carbon tax based systems (actually he hasn’t always been specific) that would incentivize the free market to produce technology that would reduce Carbon Dioxide emissions. At a later time this technology could be made available to India, China and other poor countries at low cost. Efforts in this regard are already underway. Of course this task is not easy and it will be difficult to design a policy that minimizes rent-seeking behaviours. But, the difficulty of designing working mechanisms does not obviate the need to do so.
very interesting article. I do think the technology has made india and china arrogant though. Like take my uncle and his friends who work in the IT industry..nothing but insults and putting down of the american people and companies they work with…
This has more to do with which needs on Maslow’s hierarchy are being met than anything else. Also, I believe the U.S. was in the middle of The Great Depression during the the nineteen-thirties. I must have missed the part in The Grapes of Wrath where people looked forward to technology being the key to a better life. Maybe, I should add a few lines to “Okie from Muskogie”.
The India, I know of and was born in, also has a major Naxalite movement that has prevented the civil service and the police from operating in large areas. This part of India is not well-reported about in The Wall Street Journal.
“… that finds the answer not in exuberance but in restraint. Luckily, it appears that message doesn’t sell so well in India.”
— what, pray tell, is wrong with restraint? Also, as to the either/or construct “not in exuberance but in restraint”: “The answer” is not to be found in an either/or statement, but in balance: exuberance when exuberance is called for, restraint when restraint is called for.
You got it inexcusably wrong. The 1998 Nobel was for economics not science. Indians have won 3 Nobels in the sciences. Pakistan has won one. That makes a total of 4 science nobels for desis.
Ethnic chinese have won 6 science nobels, not three as you erroneously claim. And japanese have won 9 science nobels, giving east asians a total of 15 science nobels.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nobel_laureates_by_country
Little Switzerland has won more science nobels than all of Asia combined.
American citizens have won more science nobels just since the year 2000, than asians have won ever.
The 1998 Nobel was for economics not science.
The prize is for Economic Science. The Econ nobel is considered one of the science ones; only peace and lit are not.
Ethnic chinese have won 6 science nobels, not three as you erroneously claim.
Your own link says 3. Who are the 6? I imagine you’re counting Steven Chu, Physics 97, but he was born in St. Louis…
Gosh, all this is soooo interesting. (sarcasm tags)
Here’s my list of 6 ethnic Chinese who have won science Nobels: Daniel Tsui, physics, 1998; Steve Chu, physics, 1997; Samuel Ting, physics, 1976; Tsung-Dao Lee and Chen-Ning Yang, physics, 1957, and Yuan Lee, chemistry, 1986.
Yuan Lee is Taiwan-born, Steve Chu is US born, but we count them as ethnic Chinese.
The more interesting thing, to me anyway, is that Bronx High School of Science grads, alone, won 7 physics Nobels. And in our Columbia-vs-Brown competition here at SM, we have: Columbia 82 – Brown 3.
Sigh! Its one thing to argue if there’s sufficient evidence for global warming. But equating it with socialist theories of consumerism, etc takes things to a whole new level of shallowness. I agree these ideas may be connected in the minds of some extreme left-wingers. But if you refuse to take the argument beyond that level, I have no reason to take you more seriously than I take them.
Its a funny world where one’s political affiliation is a strong predictor of one’s opinion on scientific theories. Can we start looking beyond ideology here, because this is not about the next presidential election, its about the survival of the planet.
So you think Steve Chu is not an ethnic chinese because he was born in America? And the list clearly shows two science Nobels for Taiwan. That makes a total of six chinese science Nobels vs three for indians. Economics is not a science as we usually understand the term. There is a big difference between the physical sciences and the so-called social “sciences”.
None of the three indian science laureates earned their award in Independent India. Raman won it in British India. Khorana and Chandrashekhar won it as american citizens. All this talk of India replacing America as a science superpower in the near future is balderdash. China has a far more realistic shot at it. Their leaders who are all either scientists or engineers, have abitious plans and the competence and determination to follow through. India’s educational system on the other hand is a mess. Very few of the numerous so-called engineers that are churned out in India are considered employable by western corporations.
Quant-trotsky/Shiva/Sakshi,
The issue is not whether the Earth is warming or not, or mankind is the cause or not. Maybe mankind is causing global warming and maybe it is very dangerous. That’s not the point.
The point is: Who is Gore or a bunch of scientists to tell the rest of us what to do about it? Maybe the rest of us don’t really care if the oceans rise by 2 feet over the next century. Or 200 feet. Or 2000 feet. And if we don’t care, we should not have to make the inevitable sacrifices that Gore asks us to do (higher gas prices, heating costs, etc). Maybe the rest of us are fine if the weather changes drastically. Maybe there’s some good in it. Three or Four crop yields in New Jersey instead of one? Heavy rains in Rajasthan or Arizona turning it into a green belt? Lower heating costs in the winter? Nice beach front property in Antarctica? The possibilities are endless.
We’d like to take our chances since we like to see the cup as half-full. Maybe we’re wrong and we’ll suffer, but we reserve the right to make that choice.
By all means, if you choose to not pollute, walk/bike to work, not use polluting products – more power to you. I might even join you.
But if you force something down my throat, I reserve the right to throw up on you.
M. Nam
So you think Steve Chu is not an ethnic chinese because he was born in America? And the list clearly shows two science Nobels for Taiwan.
Prema, the original article talked about India and China per se, not Taiwan and ethnic Chinese born bred and educated elsewhere. There are six ethnic Chinese who have won science Nobels, OK! But one was born in the U.S. and the other five did most of their life’s work here.
The atmosphere is shared. There is no way to split the difference. By your logic, Aum Shinrikyo should have received a free pass.
QT #34: >>The atmosphere is shared. There is no way to split the difference.
I’m sorry, but you need to live with it. By that logic, anyone can stop anyone else from polluting anywhere. I should be able to file lawsuit on a car-owner in Brazil. Thankfully, the world does not work that way.
!!!
You’re equating me driving my car with a cult that released lethal nerve gas in a closed subway at rush hour?! And you wonder why folks think you are extremist/alarmist and don’t take you seriously!
M. Nam
Moornam, It is heartening to note that you recognized your extremist position. The principle is the same. In your post, you claimed an absolute right to place whatsoever into the atmosphere. Extreme principles must not be immune to extreme conclusions that can be drawn from them. Once we agree that what can be placed into the atmosphere can be regulated then the only question is what can or cannot be regulated, not whether regulation is required.
Or die with it, maybe? I suspect more people share the position that survival is a common responsibility.
MoorNam, Lower heating costs in the winter? Nice beach front property in Antarctica? The possibilities are endless. Can you explain this further?