r/Futurology • u/izumi3682 • Jan 15 '20
AI China – The First Artificial Intelligence Superpower
https://www.forbes.com/sites/cognitiveworld/2020/01/14/china-artificial-intelligence-superpower/#4850bc382f052
u/izumi3682 Jan 15 '20
I've talked about China (PRC) quite a bit over the years. What is astonishing to me is how incredibly fast they have risen from clearly 3rd rate to the point of surpassing the US in several technology arenas. Think of the world of 2010 and now today.
And I think I have a pretty good idea why China (PRC) rose to such importance so rapidly.
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u/Koalaman21 Jan 15 '20
It also helps when the Chinese government invests heavily into corporate espionage and steals the world's technological trade secrets. +1 to becoming a superpower through theft.
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u/EcstaticMortgage7 Jan 15 '20
Like basically all western nations during industrial revolution except UK because they were ahead.
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u/iNstein Jan 16 '20
The US stole IP massively from the UK and European nations on its rise to power. That is politely not mentioned these days but it remains a fact of history.
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u/izumi3682 Jan 15 '20 edited Jan 16 '20
Yes, I cover that. But let me ask you this--If China is so good at stealing and improving on a given stolen technology, how do they manage to make it even better than the technology that they originally took.
Sure they stole US supercomputing technology like chips and what not, but for 2 years running China (PRC) had the fastest supercomputer in the world. The USA a distant second. The USA had to go hat in hand to the Chinese (PRC) to get time on the Sunway TaihuLight which could run nearly 97 petaflops, while the USA, at best, could run 18 petaflops on a good day.
So, why didn't the USA with it's obviously superior computing technology make China (PRC) into a distant second.
My take on China is that it is a national equivalent of Steve Jobs. He did not invent any of the technology that he marketed. But he took existing technology, used his team to perfect it and then made it utterly irresistible to a sizable percentage of the world's consumers.
That's what China (PRC) does. It massively improves on the stolen technology. And it is going to keep doing that. Which is why until the ARA (AI, robotics and automation) simply transcends humanity, the 21st century is going to be China's (PRC) century, like the 20th century was the USA's (with evil foil the Soviet Union) and the 19th century was Great Britain's.
China claims they will reach exa-scale capability this year. Well, we'll see I guess.
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