We are just a group of retired spooks that discuss things that you’ll not find anywhere else. It makes us unique. Take a look around. Learn a thing or two.
I have a premise that you can gauge the relative health of a nation by looking at what it is being promoted as “news” day in, and day out. While there are elements of information, promotion, propaganda, and scandal, over all by comparing the two sources you can get a general idea of the “social climate” in each individual nation. And from this, you can gauge it’s overall health and the direction of the society.
For starters, in the articles about the “other” nation, it is very interesting.
American “news” warns about the bad things about China.
Chinese news reports on the given situations inside of America.
Most of the other news discusses the events that “buy papers”, or in other words, that are of interest to the readership.
Today, a huge segment of media has been taken over by video. While article about certain subjects continue to sell, a huge percentage of media rely on videos to get their messages across. In fact, all “news” organizations have video elements as part of their articles.
I’d post some from America, but almost all of the videos come from organizations that are banned in China because they are associated with American “alphabet” agencies.
Here’s some from China…
Videos.
In regards to videos, China is all about the latest technologies, the new space station and well, you get the idea…
This is very cool. 5G, AI controlled location and positioning overlay upon the arm…
Here, we have the new space station…
Here’s a pretty girl. She has this “fish shape” that is considered to be very beautiful within China.
Here’s another gal. This is another girl that is selling her light and easy pants. I like her. She has good appeal.
Of course the news about what is going on in India with the COVID-19 and the new “India Strain” is heartbreaking. Judging from the pictures it seems to be almost as bad as the “B” strain that was unleashed on China on CNY 2020. I wonder why you aren’t seeing these images in America?
And here’s one thing that you see pretty irregularly. It’s applications of technology that are in use. In this case we see a guy using a hand sensor to map out an old village that is being torn down for new homes.
And finally a comparison of cities for fun.
Conclusions
If left alone, with no major “fire-hose of disinformation” drenching everyone with the propaganda of the day, Most media are the same. They concentrate on the things that interest their readership.
Obviously, the hate-China narrative from 2016 through 2020 had an impact.
Chinese readership want to know about technology, good things, and what’s going on in the world. More or less presented in a “neutral” fashion and manner. American readership seems to want (whether they want it or not) things that are alarming, salacious, interesting, fearful or worrisome.
America…
The “news” from America tend to fall into these kinds of categories…
I believe that these trends are indicative of the way that the people think. As well as how the entire society thinks.
Perhaps instead of thinking about controlling people to do this, or to do that via fear (the American way), maybe you should give them hope instead. Provide hope, provide help and throw in a dash of compassion.
Its the Chinese way.
And a direction, that I must add, that President Biden is attempting to do in his most recent speech. It’s a nice change of pace from what most Americans have seen or been exposed to.
Maybe there is some hope for Western society after all.
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According to modern accepted history, prior to the ability to write, most humans were very, very primitive. While they might have been able to farm, and perhaps fabricate some clothes from animal skins, that was the full extent of human progress. And most historians place this date around 5,000 years ago, with some squabbling that it might be as early as 9,000 years ago.
The Stone Age marks a period of prehistory in which humans used primitive stone tools. Lasting roughly 2.5 million years, the Stone Age ended around 5,000 years ago when humans in the Near East began working with metal and making tools and weapons from bronze.
During the Stone Age, humans shared the planet with a number of now-extinct hominin relatives, including Neanderthals and Denisovans.
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The idea that Neanderthals were able to do anything besides one or two carvings on mammoth tusks, and using bones as hammers, is considered ludicrous.
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And when they pretty much were dying out, historians believe that that was the period of time when the use of stone tools started to make way for pottery, and perhaps roughly sewn clothing.
The oldest pottery known was found at an archaeological site in Japan. Fragments of clay containers used in food preparation at the site may be up to 16,500 years old.
Stone Age food varied over time and from region to region, but included the foods typical of hunter gatherers: meats, fish, eggs, grasses, tubers, fruits, vegetables, seeds and nuts.
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But that’s pretty much the extent of it all. But, then we have an OOPART. A thing that should not exist. A thing or an item that shakes the very foundation that historians have created for the lineage of man.
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How? Well, these are the OLDEST dates that people are willing to attribute to humans…
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Homo sapiens, the first modern humans, evolved from their early hominid predecessors between 200,000 and 300,000 years ago. They developed a capacity for language about 50,000 years ago.
The first modern humans began moving outside of Africa starting about 70,000-100,000 years ago.
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Here we talk about this.
Enigmatic Ancient Wheel: The 300-Million-Year-Old Wheel and Anomalous Ancient Tracks Across the World
The following article is extracted from The Myth Of Man by J.P. Robinson. All credit to the author, and please kindly note that it was edited to fit this venue. Along with some healthy MM additions.
In 2008, a curious find was discovered down a coal mine in the Ukrainian city of Donetsk.
As it could not be safely or successfully cut out due to the nature of the sandstone in which it was embedded, the mysterious artifact looking much like an ancient wheel remains in situ down the mine.
A fossilized (previously) wooden wheel has been unearthed in a mine in Eastern Europe / Russia. It is encased in rock (sandstone) that is 300 million years old.
Whilst drilling the coal coking stratum named J3 ‘Sukhodolsky’ at a depth of 900 meters (2952.76 feet) from the surface, workers were surprised to find what appears to be the imprint of a wheel above them in the sandstone roof of the tunnel that they had just excavated.
Thankfully, photographs of the unusual imprint were taken by the Deputy Chief V.V. Kruzhilin and shared with the mine foreman S. Kasatkin, who brought news of the find to light.
Without being able to further explore the site and inspect the imprint at close hand, we are left with only the photographs as evidence of their existence (there was more than one imprint) and the word of a group of Ukrainian miners.
Discovering the Wheel
Without being able to definitively date the strata in which the fossilized wheel print was found, it has been noted that the Rostov region surrounding Donetsk is situated upon Carboniferous rock aged between 360-300 million years ago.
As well as the widely distributed coking coals have derived from the middle to late Carboniferous; suggesting a possible age of the imprint at around 300 million years old.
This would mean that an actual wheel became stuck millions of years ago and dissolved over time due to a process called diagenesis, where sediments are lithified into sedimentary rocks, as is common with fossil remains.
Diagenesis () is the process that describes physical and chemical changes in sediments first caused by water-rock interactions, microbial activityand compaction after their deposition. The increase of pressure and temperature only starts to play a role as sediments get buried much deeper in the Earth's crust.
In the early stages, the transformation of poorly consolidated sediments into sedimentary rock (lithification) is simply accompanied by a reduction in porosity and water expulsion (clay sediments), while their main mineralogical assemblages remain unaltered.
As the rock is carried deeper by further deposition above, its organic content is progressively transformed into kerogens and bitumens. The process of diagenesis excludes surface alteration (weathering) and deep metamorphism.
There is no sharp boundary between diagenesis and metamorphism, but the latter occurs at higher temperatures and pressures. Hydrothermal solutions, meteoric groundwater, rock porosity, permeability, dissolution/precipitation reactions, and time are all influential factors.
-Wikipedia
A miner below a wheel imprint in the mine. (Author provided) SMXL
The following is an extract from a letter written by S. Kasatkin (translated from Ukrainian) in reference to his testimony of having been witness to the anomalous wheel imprint discovered by his team of miners in 2008:
‘This finding is not a PR action. In due time (2008), we as a team of engineers and workers asked the mine director to invite scientists for detailed examination of the object, but the director, following the instructions of the then owner of the mine, prohibited such talks and instead only ordered to accelerate work on passing through this section of lava and on fast ‘charging’ of the section with mining equipment. Owing to that, this artifact and the smaller one found during further work came to be in a tunnel blockage and could not be taken out and studied. It is good that there were people, who in spite of the director’s prohibition, photographed this artifact. I have connections with the people who first discovered these imprints and also with those who photographed them. We have more than a dozen witnesses. As you understand, the admission in the mine is strictly limited (it is dangerous on sudden emissions) and to obtain such permit is rather difficult. The ‘wheel’ was printed on sandstone of the roof. Guys (drifters) tried to ‘cut away’ the find with pick hammers and to take it out to the surface, but sandstone was so strong (firm) that, having been afraid to damage a print, they have left it in place. At present the mine is closed (officially since 2009) and access to the ‘object’ is impossible - the equipment is dismantled and the given layers are already flooded.(with water)’
The wheel.
With only this written testimony and that of the other witnesses, the photographs remain the only proof of this anomalous imprint, but it must be deemed worthy of mention despite any difficulties verifying the details beyond that which you have read.
For, if the photographic evidence is indeed legitimate, then one must question how a man-made wheel became embedded in such ancient strata, when according to scientific orthodoxy man had not even evolved yet.
Contemporaneous Cartwheel
Here is the design of a cartwheel made out of wood that was common prior to the industrial age.
Yeah.
You all might want to compare it with the wheel found in the 300 million year old limestone.
A curious thing about this cartwheel
it’s very difficult to make out, and (as far as I know) no one bothered to measure the wheel, from the pictures, it appears diminutive.
Most cartwheels that I have seen and know of from my personal experiences tend to be large. They are perhaps, 150 cm in diameter. (With obvious variations of course). This is roughly five feet in diameter.
This wheel appears to be much less than that. Maybe 100 cm in diameter, or roughly three feet.
Judging from this singular article, and extrapolating with many assumptions, you might want to suggest that the species, or creatures that manufactured this wheel were diminutive in size as well. Perhaps, 120 cm high (4 feet).
If so, then this would be in agreement with the hand bell that was found in a lump of coal that is contemporaneous with this wheel.
The wheel apparently has metal banding on both the hub and the wheel. This implies directly, that the species that manufacturing this wheel was also able to work in metal.
Why is this an OOPART?
It’s not just that this wheel predates the “bronze age” of human technological advancement, but it predates all primates.
The wheel pre-dates to the time of the dinosaurs.
The Earth, 300 years ago…
This was a time before even the mighty dinosaurs roamed the Earth. A time in history when the plants and animals would be unrecognizable to us today, well most of them.
You’ll probably already know that at this time the Earth’s continents were fused together in the supercontinent Pangea. This supercontinent would eventually break up and produce the modern configuration of continents we are all too familiar with.
Professor Roger Steinberg from Del Mar College hand drew a sheet of paper with 5000 dots on it. He then photocopied it 200 times and stuck them all together to show his students. When shown the paper, he asked her students to guess the number of dots they could see. Estimates ranged from 4.6 billion (the age of the Earth) to 13.7 billion (the age of the Universe).
They were all shocked when he revealed it was only actually 1 million. Now imagine 60,000 of those sheets stuck together and you’ll “get a feel” for the length of time we are talking about here. Given the average dimensions for A4 paper (21 by 29.7 cm or 0.06 m2) that would cover an area of 3600 m2!
Now imagine this 300 times larger!
Incredible!
300 million years ago puts us firmly within the Palaeozoic period of geological history, technically speaking within the Permian-Pennsylvanian boundary. This was a time of great change in the animal kingdom. Amphibians had evolved into reptiles that will one day give birth to all-conquering dinosaurs in a few tens of millions of years.
300 million years ago puts us firmly within the Palaeozoic period of geological history.
The plants that were in the carboniferous period were very similar to those present in a tropical climate. It was known for swamp forest which had lots of life. Lycopsids were abundant during the Carboniferous period and were a big source of carbon. There was a lot of coal during this time period so it helped the coal a lot. Then the lycopsids went extinct due to a drying trend. After that ferns and sphenopsids were dominant.
The land was dominated by the ancestors of all mammals, the Synapsids, and the ancestor of all reptiles and birds, the Diapsids. Living Diapsids include crocodiles, lizards, snakes, and tuatara. The Synapsids would become a highly diversified group throughout the Permian ultimately evolving into the first mammals during the Triassic.
The iconic apex predator of the period, the Dimetrodon, would rule the land. This chap, although looking pretty reptilian, is actually more closely related to you than the dinosaurs that would follow it.
The Dimetrodon was the apex predator.
In the oceans, ammonites and ancient fish and sharks roamed the depths. Plant life on land was undergoing a revolution changing from the giant swamps of the Carboniferous to truly modern Gymnosperms taking dominance.
At this time in Earth’s history, the continents of the modern world were tightly locked together in the supercontinent known as Pangea. It is believed this assembly formed somewhere around 335 million years ago. It wasn’t to last, however.
The restless “gubbins” of the Earth would tear this assembly apart about 175 million years ago through a process known as plate tectonics. This gradual motion of the plates still continues today, in fact, Australia and India (they share the same plate), for example, are actually sliding northeast towards Asia and the central Pacific Ocean.
This a picture of what the world looked like during the Carboniferous Period. As you can see it looks nothing like the world we know today. The continents are in process of forming a super continent called Pangea.
So there you go. That’s how the world looked 300 million years ago. Cool eh?
The Carboniferous Period (350-300 Million Years Ago)
Some of the animals that were present during the Carboniferous period were Amphibiamus lyelli, Which had long snouts, short limbs and flattened heads. Labachia is an early relative of they conifers. Crocodiles were there and hey are still present today. There were some dinosaurs but not as many as the Mesozoic era. There was also marine reptiles, lizards,snakes, birds and land snails. They also had many insects such as big dragonflies, mayflies, millipedes, scorpions and spiders. The millipedes scorpions and spiders were very good for the environment. There was hylonomos which were lightly built with deep strong jaws and slender limbs. Some other animals were gastropods, bonyfish and sharks.
A Look at Prehistoric Life During the Carboniferous Period.
Amphibamus grandiceps, a dissorophoid temnospondyl from the late Carboniferous of Illinois.
The name “Carboniferous” reflects the most famous attribute of the Carboniferous period: the massive swamps that cooked, over tens of millions of years, into today’s vast reserves of coal and natural gas. However, the Carboniferous period (359 to 299 million years ago) was also notable for the appearance of new terrestrial vertebrates, including the very first amphibians and lizards.
Climate and Geography
The global climate of the Carboniferous period was intimately linked with its geography.
During the course of the preceding Devonian period, the northern supercontinent of Euramerica merged with the southern supercontinent of Gondwana, producing the enormous super-supercontinent Pangea, which occupied much of the southern hemisphere during the ensuing Carboniferous.
This had a pronounced effect on air and water circulation patterns, which resulted in a large portion of southern Pangea being covered by glaciers and a general global cooling trend (which, however, didn’t have much effect on the coal swamps that covered Pangea’s more temperate regions).
Inthe swampy forests of the Carboniferous Period, 360 to 286 million years ago, dragonflieswithtwo-and-a-half-foot wingspans darted among the giant ferns. Mayflies grew to canary size. Cockroachesappeared suddenly (as cockroachesdo) for the first time.
-Insects of the Oxygeniferous | DiscoverMagazine
Oxygen made up a much higher percentage of the Earth’s atmosphere than it does today, fueling the growth of terrestrial megafauna, including dog-size insects.
Terrestrial Life During the Carboniferous Period
The climate during the carboniferous period was tropical and mild temperatures. It was a uniform climate, and the early carboniferous period was relatively warm.
Amphibians. Our understanding of life during the Carboniferous period is complicated by “Romer’s Gap,” a 15-million-year stretch of time (from 360 to 345 million years ago) that has yielded virtually no vertebrate fossils.
What we do know, however, is that by the end of this gap, the very first tetrapods of the late Devonian period, themselves only recently evolved from lobe-finned fish, had lost their internal gills and were well on their way toward becoming true amphibians.
Carboniferous life.
By the late Carboniferous, amphibians were represented by such important genera as Amphibamus and Phlegethontia, which (like modern amphibians) needed to lay their eggs in water and keep their skin moist, and thus couldn’t venture too far onto dry land.
Reptiles. The most important trait that distinguishes reptiles from amphibians is their reproductive system: The shelled eggs of reptiles are better able to withstand dry conditions, and thus don’t need to be laid in water or moist ground.
The evolution of reptiles was spurred by the increasingly cold, dry climate of the late Carboniferous period.
One of the earliest reptiles yet identified, Hylonomus, appeared about 315 million years ago, and the giant (almost 10 feet long) Ophiacodon only a few million years later.
By the end of the Carboniferous, reptiles had migrated well toward the interior of Pangea. These early pioneers went on to spawn the archosaurs, pelycosaurs, and therapsids of the ensuing Permian period. (It was the archosaurs that went on to spawn the first dinosaurs nearly a hundred million years later.)
Invertebrates. As noted above, the Earth’s atmosphere contained an unusually high percentage of oxygen during the late Carboniferous period, peaking at an astounding 35%.
This surplus was especially beneficial to terrestrial invertebrates, such as insects, which breathe via the diffusion of air through their exoskeletons, rather than with the aid of lungs or gills.
Carboniferous life.
The Carboniferous was the heyday of the giant dragonfly Megalneura, the wingspan of which measured up to 2.5 feet, as well as the giant millipede Arthropleura, which attained lengths of almost 10 feet.
This is a drawing of the Dragon flies that were around during this time period. As you can see they look similar to the ones we have today except for their much larger size.
As well, as the domestically evolved Mantid species.
Insects of the Carboniferous Period
During the Carboniferous, numerous new insect families developed on Earth, with many insect species growing to incredible sizes. Fortunately, there’s a distinct lack of eight-foot-long millipedes today.
Bugs today are minuscule compared to the Carboniferous period, likely due to the way that insects breathe and how that system fails to hold up at large scales.
Invertebrate insects grew to enormous sizes.
Insect respiration relies on a series of small tubes, or tracheae, spread throughout their bodies. Most insects don’t even “breathe,” exactly, but rather allow oxygen to passively diffuse throughout their respiratory systems. When an insect gets too large, these tracheae can’t collect enough oxygen to support their bodies.
Around 300 million years ago, however, Earth was saturated with oxygen. Today’s atmosphere is 21% oxygen, while the Carboniferous period had an atmosphere that was 35% oxygen. With this overabundance, insects’ respiratory systems could support larger bodies than what we think of as typical. Being big is, generally, a good thing: large animals stand to win in a fight, can store more energy for when resources are scarce, and retain heat more efficiently.
Animals that were passive absorbers of oxygen, like insects, started growing to huge sizes. And I mean HUGE.
There was a species of caterpillar that grew to 2.5 metres in length, a scorpion that grew to 70 cm and a dragonfly that had a wingspan of 75 cm. Yikes!
Invertebrate insects grew to enormous sizes.
In fact, the size of many modern insects is only limited by ambient levels of oxygen. It’s not a genetic limit. More oxygen equals bigger size. There are scientists who are, right now, trying to grow large insects inside oxygen chambers. Someone should tell them to stop. PLEASE STOP.
For insects, there needed to be more oxygen in the air for this to happen. The extra oxygen didn’t suddenly appear, however; this change in the atmosphere can be attributed to the arrival of the first trees on the planet.
Prior to the Carboniferous period, trees didn’t exist. During this time, the first things that could properly be recognized as trees appeared. These were unlike the trees we know today—they were more like massive ferns with shallow roots that made them prone to falling over. They grew throughout the swamps that covered most of the planet during this period.
Invertebrate insects grew to enormous sizes.
However, ancient trees and modern trees do share a crucial characteristic. They both are made of a cellulose and lignin composite—wood. Wood also happens to be an excellent store of carbon. As these trees grew taller and taller to compete for sunlight, they sucked more and more carbon out of the atmosphere and exchanged it for oxygen, fundamentally changing the composition of the atmosphere.
Wood was a novel material on the planet: the fungi and microbes capable of digesting it didn’t exist yet. When these trees fell over and died, they stayed in place. Tree trunks slowly accumulated over the swampy Earth, storing away much of the carbon in the atmosphere. This is where the name of this period of time comes from: Carboniferous is Latin for coal-bearing. In fact, as layers of dead trees piled on top of each other, they were gradually compressed into a massive layer of coal, which is where we get most of the coal we use today.
Invertebrate insects grew to enormous sizes.
All of this paints a very surreal picture of ancient Earth. It would have been a moist, swampy place covered in endless fields of timber and giant ferns, crawling with Lovecraftian insects the size of your arm or larger.
Crazed boffins in the USA say they have successfully carried out a Jurassic Park-style project in which enormous flesh-eating creatures from the remote prehistoric past have been successfully bred in the laboratory. Incomprehensibly this laboratory is not located on a remote island.
As many readers will doubtless be aware, during the late Paleozoic era the Earth was, if not exactly ruled or terrorized, at the least very seriously bothered by swarms of gigantic dragonflies with wingspans around 70cm across. The monster insects will have been all the more troublesome as dragonflies “need to hunt live prey”, according to experts.
One such expert is Dr John VandenBrooks, who has after a lengthy struggle managed to breed such much-enlarged dragonflies in his Arizona laboratory. The large size was achieved by enhancing atmospheric oxygen levels to 31 per cent, as seen in the Paleozoic (today’s air is only about 20 per cent O2).
Proudly showing off the results of their genetic experimentation.
The hard bit, according to the prof, was not the creation of this artificially enriched (or “hyperoxic”) atmosphere but the actual care and feeding of the monstrous, prehistoric winged flesh-eaters.
“Dragonflies are notoriously difficult to rear,” boasts VandenBrooks. “We are one of the only groups to successfully rear them to adulthood under laboratory conditions.”
According to a statement issued by the Geological Society of America:
There is no such thing as dragonfly chow. As juveniles they need to hunt live prey and in fact undergraduate students Elyse Muñoz and Michael Weed working with Dr VandenBrooks had to resort to hand feeding the dragonflies.
It’s to be hoped that the unfortunate undergrads escaped from the hyperoxia chambers with their hands and other body parts intact. Plenty more where they came from, no doubt.
Not content with his creation of huge flesh-eating Paleozoic hyper-dragonflies, VandenBrooks also sought to breed greatly enlarged cockroaches and other horrors using similar hypercharged breeding pens. However this time the experiments were a failure, even once the hyper-roaches had been blasted with incredibly powerful energy rays at a handy atom-smasher.
The disappointed prof, perhaps assisted by surviving members of his team, is to reveal details of his accomplishments at a convention in Colorado.
Yikes!
Giant Millipede.
Marine Life During the Carboniferous Period
With the extinction of the distinctive placoderms (armored fish) at the end of the Devonian period, the Carboniferous isn’t especially well known for its marine life, except insofar as some genera of lobe-finned fish were closely related to the very first tetrapods and amphibians that invaded dry land.
Falcatus, a close relative of Stethacanthus, is probably the best-known Carboniferous shark, along with the much bigger Edestus, which is known primarily by its teeth.
As in preceding geologic periods, small invertebrates like corals, crinoids, and arthropods were plentiful in the Carboniferous seas.
Plant Life During the Carboniferous Period
The dry, cold conditions of the late Carboniferous period weren’t especially hospitable to plants—but that still didn’t prevent these hardy organisms from colonizing every available ecosystem on dry land.
The Carboniferous witnessed the very first plants with seeds, as well as bizarre genera like the 100-foot-tall club moss Lepidodendron and the slightly smaller Sigillaria.
Lepidodendron trees. However, by most accounts they existed in dense forests with very thick and deep swampy undergrowth. So if you add that green boggy mess to the picture you would have a better idea of what the tree actually looked like.
The most important plants of the Carboniferous period were the ones inhabiting the large belt of carbon-rich “coal swamps” around the equator, which were later compressed by millions of years of heat and pressure into the vast coal deposits we use for fuel today.
Bruno, a fellow forum member and moderator of the naturalistes forum has a ton of plant fossil examples and reconstruction info over on that site..
Take a look at each page and you'll see the closeup detail of fossils of the genus Lepidodendron and lots of reconstructions that will help your cause.
He's also got a wealth of info on the other major plant members of the forest in that website....days and days worth of fossil images and reconstructions. It is a treasure!
http://forums-naturalistes.forums-actifs.com/t2395-lepidodendron-sternberg-1820
Carboniferous period summary
During this period in time, there was one super continent on the earth. It had plentiful oxygen which permitted the evolution of insects to grow to enormous sizes and develop specialized intelligence’s over the years.
Most other creatures were still primitive and resembled proto-dinosaurs. These were smaller creatures that were just then finding their way on the food chain. There were NO apes, primates or humans.
Ancient Tracks
Yet…
Evidence for the existence of wheeled vehicles in antiquity has surfaced all over the world. They do so as petrified ancient tracks.
They are found in France, Spain, Italy, Malta, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and even North America.
Prehistoric “Cart ruts”
"I believe we’re seeing the indicators of the civilization which existed sooner than the vintage introduction of this global,” Dr. Koltypin mentioned. “All those rocky fields had been coated with ruts left thousands and thousands of years in the past…we don’t seem to be speaking about human beings. We are coping with some more or less automobiles or all-terrain vehicles.”
-Alienpolicy
A prehistoric site known formally as Misrah Ghar il-Kbir meaning the Great Cave in Maltese (and commonly referred to as Clapham Junction), is located at Siggiewi, near the Dingli Cliffs in Malta.
It is at this now famous site that what have been termed ‘cart ruts’ cut into the limestone have mystified all that have visited the area.
Cart ruts suggestive of an axle connected pair of wheels.
Likewise, a number of unusual tracks in stone are also visible on the island of Sicily at the Greek amphitheater called the Great Theater of Syracuse.
Interestingly, and paradoxically, most archaeologists have suggested that the Maltese tracks were probably created by Sicilian settlers who traveled to Malta around 2000 BC at the start of the Bronze Age.
Yet more tracks are to be found in Turkey.
Some at Sofca cover an area roughly 45 by 10 miles (72.42 by 16.09 km), and also in Cappadocia, where several pockets of tracks can be seen.
The many ruts discovered around the world have caused a great deal of controversy as to their purpose, age, and origin.
These mysterious objects remain up for debate, but due to the association and close proximity with megalithic structures, in Malta particularly, and due to the fact that many tracks are now submerged below the sea in that region, many researchers have concluded that the fossilized lines show signs of great antiquity.
‘Cart rut’ tracks in Sofca, Turkey. (Author provided)
Bizarrely, considering the anomalous wheel print discovered in Ukraine that we have just discussed, a medieval city-fortress in the Crimean Mountains of Ukraine called Chufut-Kale lies in ruins, but also plays host to a number of cart ruts in stone like those at the nearby site of Eski-Kermen.
"We can think that ancient vehicles on wheels had been drove on comfortable soil, perhaps a rainy floor, and as a result of their weight the ruts had been so deep. Later those ruts – and all the floor round – simply petrified and secured all the proof,”
-Alienpolicy
Dr. Alexander Koltypin is a geologist and director of the Natural Science Research Center at Moscow’s International Independent University of Ecology and Politology.
He has spent a great deal of time visiting these sites and comparing them to one another in search of similarities.
“I first saw tracks in stone - fossilized car or terrain vehicle traces (usually called cart ruts) on Neogen plantation surface (peneplene in Phrygian) plain in May 2014 (Central Anatolia Turkey).
They were situated in the field of development of Middle and Late Miocene tuffs and tuffites and according to age analysis of nearby volcanic rocks, had middle Miocene age of 12-14 million years,” wrote Koltypin.
This particular region which Koltypin has researched further is relatively unknown and the guide books offer nothing in the way of information.
Whilst orthodox researchers claim that the tracks are simply the remnants of old petrified cart ruts from the kind of wheeled vehicles which donkeys or camels would have pulled, Koltypin has other ideas.
“I will never accept it,” he explained when confronted with the standard explanations. “I myself will always remember . . . many other inhabitants of our planet wiped from our history.”
Raddet ir-Roti Cart Ruts, Xemxija Heritage Trail in St. Paul’s Bay, Malta. (Frank Vincentz/ CC BY SA 3.0 )
Upon measuring the width and length of the tracks at the Phrygian Valley site, he is convinced that they were created by vehicles of a similar length to modern cars but with tires 9 inches (22.86 cm) wide.
With the depth of the impressions of the tracks in stone exceeding that which one would associate with small carts, Koltypin maintains that the vehicles responsible must have been much heavier.
"As a geologist, I will unquestionably inform you that unknown antediluvian (sooner than the flood) all-terrain vehicles drove round Central Turkey some 12-14 million years in the past. The technique of specifying the age of volcanic rocks may be very smartly studied and labored out,”-Alienpolicy
He theorizes that whichever civilization drove the heavy vehicles that created the tracks were most likely responsible for the many different but identical roads, ruts and underground complexes which are scattered around the entire Mediterranean, more than 12 million years ago.
Aware that the process of petrification can occur within a relatively short period, Koltypin insists that the heavy mineral deposits which coat the tracks and the visible erosion are suggestive of…
…of a greater antiquity;
…along with the surrounding underground cities, irrigation systems, wells, and more, which also show signs of being millions of years old in his view.
Koltypin wrote on his website,
‘We are dealing with extremely tough lithified (petrified) sediments, covered with a thick layer of weathering, that takes millions of years to develop, full of multiple cracks with newly developed minerals in them, which could only emerge in periods of high tectonic activity.’
It is evident that much research is needed to clarify the age and origin of the many tracks that are being discovered.
Discoveries which occur at multiple geographical locations, all over the world.
And yes, it is easy to simply state that they are the product of old carts which once trundled through these parts.
But actual investigation may well reveal far more complex and remarkable explanations which could well correlate with other things.
Other things, such as the mysterious remnants of an unknown ancient civilization as postulated by Alexander Koltypin.
The sheer presence of the fossilized wheel found in the Ukraine is certainly suggestive of the fact that the ancients may have had access to more technology and know-how than is currently accepted.
Especially when we KNOW that the world pretty much looked a little like this…
About the ruts
Don’t the ruts resemble trying to move carts through very marshy, muddy land? Just exactly the kind of terrain and environment that existed 300 million years ago?
Typical terrain 300 million years ago.
Conclusion
Dates are being bantered about of 300 million years, and 12 million years. In any event these dates pre-date apes, monkeys, primates and proto-humans.
Yet, we find the impossible.
Not only a wheel firmly embedded deep down inside a mine shaft, but ruts that take many centuries to harden into stone. Couple that with the discoveries of chains, metal lamps, bells, and other objects all pulled out of 300 million year old coal, it makes one wonder what is really going on.
Perhaps instead of trying to reationalize how these OOPART objects can exist relative to the history that is taught in school, perhaps we should realize that at signifigant points in time…
…in this case,
300 million years ago
12 million years ago
…that civilizations existed upon the earth. That these civilizations possessed tool-making ability, (as shown in other articles) metal forming ability, and the ability to work together in groups to create large megalithic structures that resemble boulders and rocks today.
And…
…instead of saying that mankind, or proto-humans created these objects, wouldn’t it be cleaner, more sensible, and easier to simply acknowledge that there must have been other civilizations, populated by other creatures living upon the earth at those far, far distant times.
A diminutive, and smaller than human, species… capable of living in a high oxygen content environment… where the oxygen made them grow to enormous sizes (though still smaller than humans). Capable of fabricating things out of wood, such as the Lepidodendron tree. And capable of metal working, which means that they had control over fire, and an understanding on how to mine ore.
And when we understand that point, we are truly able to see the insignificance of the human species on the grand scale of things.
Do you want more?
I have more posts like this in my OOPARTs Index here…
You’ll not find any big banners or popups here talking about cookies and privacy notices. There are no ads on this site (aside from the hosting ads – a necessary evil). Functionally and fundamentally, I just don’t make money off of this blog. It is NOT monetized. Finally, I don’t track you because I just don’t care to.
Today I woke up at the crack of dawn, made my self a nice stout coffee (after I washed my face) and ate it with some buttered baguettes. It’s a nice little routine that I have, especially since I found a bakery that makes these kinds of bread instead of the soft and sweet “sponge cakes” (style breads) that are irritatingly common throughout China these days.
Sweet breads are not my favorite, though. Bagels are. And finding a proper bagel in China is an exercise in futility.
My old dog was snoring and barking in his deep doggie dreams. His little doggie paws were making padding moves and he was softly barking between his snoring.
It was a nice lovely and calm morning.
I sat down, fired up my computers, sat down (after I measured my blood pressure) and checked my email, as the dawn was lightening up. I could feel the fresh ocean breeze carry the fragrances of the local flowers, and the birds were singing their morning songs. It was calm and pleasant.
Uncle MM has left me some bars of gold…
What do you know!
My long lost great uncle Metallicman has died without any heirs. And I am the closest relative. Who would have figured?
What are the odds?
What’s more, he’s got a couple of billion dollars in the bank and I was contacted to see if I was his long, lost relative.
My goodness. Imagine that!
My name is Fabian Artoro, an asset management brokerage consultant. I am contacting you on behalf of my late client who worked as an independent engineering contractor in a gold mining company in my country, the Republic of Ghana.
He was my client until his sudden demise on the 24th of April 2018, fatal car crash, his wife and their only daughter were all involved in that car crash along Kumassi express Road.
Sadly, all occupants of the vehicle, unfortunately, lost their lives. My client had funds, a huge amount in one of the financial institutions here and it is in the process of being confiscated by the state as unclaimed funds...
I’m sure it is legitimate.
Don’t you?
Well, After checking my normal (tap, click and move on) websites, and finding out that they are all parroting the same-old, same-old nonsense, I moved on. You do get tired of the same spiel day in, and day out.
What am I talking about?
Well, I am talking about this…
First up, your daily dose of Anti-China…
It’s been a daily top-line item in my feeds since 2016.
Reminds me of the movie “Battleship”. Nice CGI, by the way. And yeah, this was the entire plot and story line behind it. Don’t you know…
Well that was about as useful as giving a dolphin a pair of crutches.
So then it’s off to MM, and I check the comments. Ohhh baby!
MM Comment Section
Right there at the top of my comment “awaiting approval” list is this piece of insulting passive-aggressive bullshit.
I see you’re still doing the bidding of your new country comrade, it’s dishonest to hide the fact that you are a round-eyed Chinese operative…apparently there is no such thing as a retired intelligence officer.
I am too old for this nonsense.
I’ve lived in China for nearly two decades and no one has ever used the term “comrade“. I guess this jackass never got the memo. He’s probably still talking about how groovy the Mod Squad is, and fondling his “love beads”.
I’m dishonest? Even in prison they told me that I “couldn’t lie worth shit“. I can’t. So I just don’t try. I tell you it straight. You either take it or not. It really makes my life simpler. What you see is what you get.
“Round eyes” sounds pretty fucking racist to me.
Idiots abound in this world.
Sometimes I wonder if they really believe what they say, or that they want to live inside a rotten world-line template. This “fellow” is certainly making his MWI topographical map “interesting“.
Here’s a MM secret; if you want to have a nice calm and happy life, make others happy. If you want to have a problem-some, and tumultuous life, then spend your time making others miserable.
Anyways, it’s 7am and I could use a beer.
Do you “feel” me?
Beer and pancakes.
The rest of the world is not my problem. You all will see what the fuck is going on in your little neck of the woods soon enough. Especially this piece of shit (will).
Anyways…
I am sorry that I have been so busy with all these other issues lately. But I do “feel” a need to start post more MAJestic related stuff, and that means OOPART stuff as well.
Which leads me to this mystery…
The Aiud Mystery in Transylvania
Yeah. Aiud is in the Transylvania region of Romania. It in the state of Alba. It’s that triangle shaped region in the map below.
The Transylvania region of Romania.
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Of all the hundreds of websites about this mystery object, not one single one bothered to look up Aiud on a map. They just cut and paste from other websites.
Slothful. Lazy.
Money-grubbing. Greedy.
“For-profit” oriented assholes.
Doesn’t anyone ever just do things because they WANT to do it? Jeeze!
Anyways, in 1974, in Romania, East of Aiud, (in Transylvania) a group of workers, on the banks of the river Mures, discovered three buried objects in a sand trench 10 meters deep.
In sand, near a river, implies that the river eventually covered these items and buried them in silt. Then later, when the river became smaller or changed it’s path, the silt remained as sandy soil.
Of the three items, two of the objects proved to be Mastodon bones. These dating from between the Miocene and the Pleistocene periods. The third object — the Aluminum Wedge of Aiud, also known as the Object of Aiud, is a mysterious wedge-shaped block of aluminum metal.
The mysterious aluminum object was discovered by chance in 1974 at a depth of 10 meters at a quarry by the banks of river Mures near the Romanian town of Aiud. The artifact weighs approximately 2 kilos (length: 21cm; width: 12.5 cm; thickness: 7cm).
According to researchers and engineers it appears very similar to the feet fused on modern landing gear found on aircraft with vertical landing and take-off.
For conventional investigators it appears as a hammer head.
In its vicinity researchers found two mastodon bones(extinct large tusked mammal species that lived between 10,000 and 80,000 BC). Based on the findings next to the object it can be assumed that the object is at least 10,000 years old.
-HistoryDisclosure
Because it is out of place, it is considered an OOPART.
After all, contemporaneous belief is that Mastodons were unable to fabricate tools, let alone precision manufacture of aircraft components. They didn’t have opposing thumbs, don’t you know. Let alone the fact that those enormous tusks of theirs would get in the way of precision manufacturing…
That goes as well for the local humans at the time. They are considered to be primitive.
Early humans. (Romanticized.)
.
So what the heck is a pawl from a landing gear doing with some mastodon bones near a river in Romania?
Dating the object
According to conventional history the artifact should not exist since aluminum was discovered in 1807 and wasn’t produced in any usable form until after 1886.
A subsequent dating analysis (I haven’t been able to find details on the dating technique used) on the artifact indicated that it was at least 200,000 years old.
This date apparently came from the geological evidence where the bones and pawl were found. When the “front end loader” excavated the trench (or what ever equivalent did so in the 1970’s in Romania) the soil, and the mastodon bones indicated a very approximate date sometime within the Pleistocene.
Mastodon, (genus Mammut), any of several extinctelephantine mammals (family Mammutidae, genus Mammut) that first appeared in theearlyMiocene (23 million to 2.6 million years ago) and continued in various forms through the Pleistocene Epoch (from 2.6 million to 11,700 years ago).
-Mastodon | Description, Distribution, Extinction, & Facts ...
Depending on the particular dating of the bones, we can assume that the pawl was contemporaneous with the bones in some way. Which could mean that the primitive humans picked up this pawl at some point in time, and were using it to smash open Mastodon bones for food.
.
Obviously they weren't using it on one of their aircraft, or it just suddenly "fell off" some aircraft speeding along two million years ago, eh?
.
The dating (on the Mastodon bones) would be somewhere between 23 million years ago and 11,700 million years ago. Which is a (phew!) long span of time.
.
So I’m not in agreement with the dating of the trench, the location, the bones, or anything else. Except to say that the aluminum predates the discovery, manufacture and utilization of aluminum in that form and shape. Thus making it an OOPART.
However, a conjecture…
Perhaps primitive man found this aluminum pawl, and found a use for it. It is very useful for cracking open bones to get at the marrow.
.
If we go ahead with the idea that perhaps a primitive human or pre-human picked up this aluminum pawl in it’s travels…
…and thinking that it is a nice “stone”, being light and easy to carry (5 pounds), with a nice pointed end…
…that shows abrasions on the pointed ends and sides…
…which makes this scenario likely…
…then we can date this part as used as a tool by the pre-humanoids in that region at that time.
The oldest handmade stone tools discovered yet predate any known humans and may have been wielded by an as-yet-unknown species, researchers say.
The 3.3-million-year-old stone artifacts are the first direct evidence that early human ancestors may have possessed the mental abilities needed to figure out how to make razor-sharp stone tools. The discovery also rewrites the book on the kind of environmental and evolutionary pressures that drove the emergence of toolmaking.
Chimpanzees and monkeys are known to use stones as tools, picking up rocks to hammer open nuts and solve other problems. However, until now, only members of the human lineage — the genus Homo, which includes the modern human species Homo sapiens and extinct humans such as Homo erectus — were thought capable of making stone tools. [See Photos of the Oldest Stone Tools]
Ancient stone artifacts from East Africa were first uncovered at Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania in the mid-20th century. Those stone tools were later associated with fossils of the ancient human species Homo habilis, discovered in the 1960s.
-LiveScience
So…
This aluminum pawl could be 2.3 million years old.
Humans during the Pleistocene
Let’s have Caleb Strom explain what “humans” were like during this time. (From here.)
Theevolution of anatomically modern humans took place during the Pleistocene. In the beginning of the Pleistocene Paranthropus species were still present, as well as early human ancestors, but during the lower Palaeolithic they disappeared, and the only hominin species found in fossilic records is Homo erectus for much of the Pleistocene.
-Pleistocene - Wikipedia
The Pleistocene epoch is a geologic epoch which began around 2.6 Mya (Million years ago) and came to an end around 11,700 BP (Before Present). It is characterized by lower sea levels than the present epoch and colder temperatures. During much of the Pleistocene, Europe, North America, and Siberia were covered by extensive ice sheets and glaciers. The Pleistocene was an important time because it was when the human genus first evolved.
The Pleistocene ( PLYSE-tə-seen, -toh-, often colloquially referred to as the Ice Age) is the geological epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the world's most recent period of repeated glaciations.
The end of the Pleistocene corresponds with the end of the last glacial period and also with the end of the Paleolithic age used in archaeology. The name is a combination of Ancient Greek πλεῖστος (pleīstos, "most") and καινός (kainós (latinized as cænus), "new".
-Wikipedia
The flora and fauna today also more or less reached their current form during the Pleistocene. Most Pleistocene animals and Pleistocene plants also exist in the Holocene. Furthermore, the Pleistocene epoch was the last geological epoch in which humans had relatively little impact.
While parts of the world were dryer – such as central Europe, which was mostly covered in tundra, other parts of the world were wetter and greener.
Many of the animals common today were also common in the Pleistocene. Deer, big cats, apes, elephants, and bears could all be found in a Pleistocene landscape. There were also animals that were common which have since gone extinct, such as mammoths, mastodons, saber-toothed cats, giant ground sloths , and pre-human hominins .
Europe and Asia had significant populations of African fauna. Cave paintings and paleontological finds in Europe reveal that rhinoceroses, lions, and hyenas were all common at that time in southern Europe. The island of Sicily was also inhabited by a dwarf elephant species until surprisingly recent times. Northern Europe was covered in glaciers and inhospitable, while central Europe was tundra. Southern Europe, however, contained forests and was inhabited by numerous species of megafauna, most of which have since died out.
Another important development on the Pleistocene timeline was the emergence of the human genus: Homo. Humans probably evolved out of bipedal apes, such as the Australopithecines and Ardipithecus Ramidus . These early bipedal apes are classified as hominins. Hominins first evolved near the end of the Miocene epoch (25-5 Mya) in south and east Africa. Other than their upright posture and bipedalism, these hominins were not significantly more human than previous apes.
Their skeletons indicate that they resembled modern apes such as chimpanzees and their use of tools was limited or absent. At the beginning of the Pleistocene, however, a new type of hominin appeared. These hominins were taller, more dependent on upright locomotion, and had larger brains, which allowed them to excel in tool use over any previous hominin. These hominins belong to the genus Homo and hominins in this genus are simply called humans.
The earliest human species was Homo Habilis . The first examples of this species appeared about 2.3 million years ago. They used simple flake tools which were made by taking rocks and striking sharp flakes off other rocks – which could be used as cutting tools. Homo Habilis was more technologically inclined than its hominin predecessors, but it was still closer to earlier and more ape-like hominins than modern humans.
Homo Habilis
The next earliest human species is Homo Erectus . The first H. Erectus evolved around 2 million years ago and the last of them did not die out until sometime within the last 100,000 years. Archaeological and paleontological evidence suggest that they may have been the first humans to use culture as a wholesale approach to adapt to their environment. They were more advanced tool users and were also much taller than previous hominins, about six feet (1.83 meters) tall. They were also the first humans to leave Africa. By 1 million years ago, H. Erectus had spread to both Europe and Asia, bringing humans for the first time to these regions.
Homo Erectus
The earliest humans were universally hunter-gatherers. Their use of technology to interact with their environment made them very adaptative – so that humans eventually found their way into every possible environment on the planet: forests, grasslands, deserts, even tundra.
For most of the Pleistocene, humans did not significantly impact their environment. There were no more than a few hundred thousand individuals at a given time and their ability to transform the landscape was limited by primitive technology and limited social organization.
This all changed with the emergence of Homo Sapiens (modern humans) in Africa and Homo Neandertalensis (Neanderthals) in Europe.
Neanderthal
Anatomically modern humans first evolved in Africa around 200,000-300,000 BP. After the emergence of anatomically modern humans, something happened, perhaps a rewiring of the human brain , that led to the emergence of modern behaviors like art, blade production, long distance trade, and more efficient, organized hunting, among other abilities.
This change in behavior caused humans to have a significantly larger influence on their environment than in previous times. This can be seen in the fate of most megafauna, especially in the New World. Megafauna extinctions occurred around 40,000-50,000 years ago in Australia and around 13,000 years ago in North America. Both occurred shortly after the appearance of humans on these continents.
…
Obviously, Homo Neandertalensis (Neanderthals) are unlikely to have mined ore, smelted it, studied how to create alloys, formed it into aircraft components, and machines it for use in aircraft.
Thus we have an OOPART worthy of investigation.
Homo Neandertalensis (Neanderthals) are unlikely to have manufactured this aluminum pawl object.
An investigation ensues
So of course, if you are part of a construction crew and you dig up some bones, and other odd objects you call the authorities. And if the bones or objects look old, you call in the experts from the local museum, college or university to have a look.
Thus the object was sent to the archeological institute of Cluj-Napoca.
After the investigation and study, the block was donated to the History Museum of Transylvania, to be rediscovered and analyzed many years later. (I cover that later on.) Its weight turned out to be 5 pounds, and its approximate measurements are 20 x 12.5 x 7 centimeters.
There are two holes of different sizes.
The object has two arms like features.
Traces of abrasion can be seen on the sides of the object and at its lowest point.
Dr. Niederkorn of the institute for the study of metals and non-metallic minerals located in Magurele, Romania, concluded that the object is comprised of a alloy of an extremely complex metal.
He was not exaggerating.
Twelve different elements combine to form the Aiud Object. It consists of: 89% aluminum, 6.2% copper, 2.84% silicon, 1.81% zinc, 0.41% lead, 0.33% tin, 0.2% zirconium, 0.11% cadmium, 0.0024% nickel, 0.0023% cobalt, 0.0003% bismuth, and trace of galium.
Furthermore, this strange object is covered with a thick layer of aluminum oxide, which lends credence to its antiquity.
"After the analysis of this aluminum oxide layer, "specialists" have confirmed that the object is a minimum of 300 to 400 years old."
But that’s a bullshit guess.
The generation of aluminum oxide depends on the environment and the particular alloy that is being used. Unless you have that exact alloy of aluminum and put it though accelerated life testing, in the environment in question, it is IMPOSSIBLE to determine the age of anything.
Accelerated life testing
Accelerated life testing? What is that?
Well, it’s a common enough and fundamental aspect of engineering product design, but unknown to most other people. it is a way of estimating the life of a product due to environmental concerns. It’s a pretty handy and mature method for determine the life of a given object, or going backwards, the age of an object.
So here’s some basic links for the interested explorer…
But what we really want to determine is the accelerated life test due to corrosion. In that case similar, but more specialized tests must be conducted…
Anacceleratedcorrosiontest is a cyclic climate test for determination of thecorrosionresistance of various types of coatings. In an acceleratedcorrosiontest, corrosion, corrosiontest, corrosion, degradation or failure of materials and products are inducedwithoutchangeincorrosion mechanism (s) in a shorter time period than under normal conditions.
-What is an Accelerated Corrosion Test (ACT)? - Definition ...
www.corrosionpedia.com/definition/1503/accelerated-corrosion-test-act
Different alloys of aluminum oxidase differently. Some alloys are great for marine environments, while others are not that great, but have better strength characteristics. Further complicating the issue is the environment. Exposure to a dry environment is quite different from sitting with in a bog or sandy soil.
The ONLY way that you can accurately test for the oxidation characteristics of a new alloy is to perform extended life testing on a sample of the aluminum alloy within a simulated environment. Otherwise your estimates on aging through oxidation are all wrong.
The Aluminum Pawl. Note the two holes clearly shown.
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Many people have things to say about this object and opinions on dating it.
No one is saying that the aluminum pawl is recent. Aside from making them look silly in the eyes of their contemporaries, it’s obvious that this chunk of metal is old. Really old. The level of corrosion on the object far exceeds any kind of contemporaneous aluminum corrosion. It’s just simply very extraordinary and unusual.
And because of this there are numerous statements being made…
The fact that this strange metal object was found alongside Mastadon bones does cause one to wonder and raises many issues.
And...
Other specialists claim that the object could be 20,000 years old because it was found in a layer with mastodon bone. Perhaps this particular specimen lived in the latter part of the Pleistocene.
And...
Some researchers suppose that this piece of metal was part of a flying object that had fallen into the river. They presume that it had an extraterrestrial origin. Other researchers believe the wedge was made here on Earth and its purpose has not yet been identified.
Ah…
Some have speculated that this object is part of an Aircraft
It looks like a badly corroded locking latch from the retraction mechanism of an aircraft’s undercarriage, but that can’t be….surely?
Can it?
The retraction mechanism of an aircraft’s undercarriage.
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These mechanisms come in all sorts of sizes and shapes. But the closest thing to explain the operational features and functions of this aluminum pawl is the aircraft retraction mechanisms in contemporary aircraft.
I mean it’s more likely that this item was the part of some kind of landing gear mechanism than say a “frying pan”, a “pick axe”, a “railway train wheel”, a metal frame for a window”, a “water pipe” or an “anvil”.
Which makes one wonder what is one doing 2.5 million years ago, being used to break up the bones of a mastodon.
Primitive man would use stones and heavy objects to break open the bones of hunted animals to obtain the marrow inside of the bones.
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Could it have ended up down amongst bones that were deposited thousands of years ago by chance? It just happened to fall off an aircraft, that just happened to be flying a few million years ago, and it just happened to fall into the remains of a dead mastodon.
I guess it could.
Anything is possible.
And while it is possible, it is not probable.
The simplest explanation is probably the closest to the truth.
Whilst it is likely that the philosophy was posthumously attributed to him, as it was based upon common medieval philosophy, it seems to be a result of his minimalist lifestyle.
Occam's razor is more commonly described as 'the simplest answer is most often correct,' although this is an oversimplification. The 'correct' interpretation is that entities should not be multiplied needlessly.Researchers should avoid 'stacking' information to prove a theory if a simpler explanation fits the observations.
Occam's razor is the process of paring down information to make finding the truth easier.In science, it is getting rid of all the assumptions that make no difference to the predictions of the hypothesis. If you have a few hypotheses that could explain an observation, it is usually best to start with the simplest one.-How Occam's Razor Works | HowStuffWorks
Or in other words, look for the simplest explanation, and then go from there. You add and include or discount and discard theories that fit or don’t fit the investigation that you are performing.
Landing gear.
Names on a landing gear
I call it a pawl. But who knows what it’s actual role was.
pawl. (pôl) n. A hinged or pivoted device adapted to fit into a notch of a ratchet wheel to impart forward motionor prevent backward motion. [Perhaps variantofpale or pole, or from French pal (from Old French; see pale1 ).]
-Pawl - definitionofpawlbyTheFreeDictionary
It’s actual use name would be better described differently.
The specific names used on the various elements of an aircraft landing gear mechanism.
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Perhaps instead of a pawl, I could refer to it as a “drag strut to trunnion link walking beam“. Do you think that it would make things clearer?
Aiud in Romania
Ok, well let’s review where it was found. maybe some of you might want to hop on a plane and investigate for yourselves. You know, like Anonymous Jane did regarding the fuselage in The Fuselage embedded within the rocks of Victoria Falls.
If you do, I would be more than happy to post some of your pictures and info here. This is, after all, a collaborative effort.
Location of Romania. (This is for you Americans out there. The rest of the world pretty much knows where Romania is on a map.)
Map of Europe.
As far as where the town is, you need to look on a map. Here is a Romanian political map showing the location of Aiud. It is in the Alba (or Alba Lulia) state, which looks like a triangle.
A map of the various political regions of Romania.
And within this state we can find the location of Aiud in Romania.
A map of Alba, within Romania clearly showing the location of Aiud. “X” marks the spot.
Romania in the Miocene and the Pleistocene
Of course, a few thousand to a few million years ago Romania didn’t look like it does today. There was a lot of water there. With the Carpathian mountains creating a line of islands that interrupted a much larger Black Sea. If the dating was a million years ago, then we can say that the proto-humans who found and used this pawl were not all that far from the shorelines or feeding rivers to the Black Sea.
Palinspastic map for the Late Miocene with indication of palaeobiogeographic units (modified after Popov et al., 2004). Pannonian area emended after Magyar et al. (1999).
Outlines are drawn after palaeogeographic reconstructions or sediment distributions.
Faunas of freshwater systems fringing the Eastern Paratethys and the Italian 'Lago-mare' assemblage do not form a homogenous palaeogeographic entity. They are based on too many localities to be clearly indicated on the map. The Illyrian Region is only poorly supported by the analysis and represents the expiration of the Middle Miocene faunas of that region. Its incorporation into the present framework is only tentative.
Abbreviations: CPMCentral Peri-Mediterranean Dominion; NA-North Aegean Dominion; CA-Central Aegean Dominion; SAA-South Aegean-Anatolian Dominion; 1-Lower Tagus (w); 2-São Teotónio (l); 3-Duero (l); 4-Madrid (l); 5-Teruel (fl); 6-Baix Llobregat (b); 7-Alcalà de Xivert (u); 8-Cabriel (l); 9-Ayora (u); 10-Valencia (u); 11-Granada (l); 12-Spanish 'Lagomare' (b); 13-Palma (b); 14-Bresse-Valence (f); 15-Lower Rhône (m); 16-French 'Lago-mare' (b); 17-Torino hills (b); 18-Volterra (b); 19-Casino (b); 20-Velona (l); 21Cinigiano-Baccinello (l); 22-Sicilian 'Lago-mare' (b); 23-Bełchatów (l); 24-Turiec (l); 25-Pannon (b); 26-Dacia (b, l); 27-Kherson-Odessa region (b); 28-Black Sea depression (b); 29-Rioni Bay (b); 30-Kura Gulf (b); 31-Jazvina (l); 32-Kamengrad (l); 33-Posušje (l); 34-Sarajevo (l); 35-Kosovo (l); 36-Metohia (l); 37-Skopje (l); 38-Stanintsi (w); 39-Katerini (b); 40-Thessaloniki (b); 41-Strimon (b); 42-Limni (w); 43-Markopoulo (l); 44-Athens (l); 45-Gythio (b); 46-Kythira (b); 47-Naxos (u); 48-Heraklion (l); 49-Rhodos (l); 50-Kefalos (fl); 51-Kos (east) (l); 52-Mytilini (fl); 53-Denizli (b); 54-Cumaovası (l); 55-Dumlupınar-Siçanli (u); 56-Behramkale (u); 57-Marmara (f).
Environments are characterised as: b-brackish; f-fluviatile; fl-fluvio-lacustrine; l-lacustrine; m-marginal marine; w-wetlands; u-unknown.
History of Aluminum
This pawl is puzzling because pure aluminum was not readily obtainable until the middle of the 19th century.
Aluminum is not found freely in nature, but is combined with other minerals.
The manufacturing process requires 1,221°F (660.32°C) degrees of heat. Only in the last 100 years or so has the technology existed to successfully separate the materials from the mineral bearing ore.
For decades after it was first identified by British chemist Sir Humphry Davy in the early 1800s, scientists and tinkerers tried, and mostly failed, to find a good method for separating aluminum from everything else that stuck to it.
France’s Emperor Napoleon III was an early proponent of aluminum. He hoped the lightweight metal could be used to produce weapons and armor, giving his soldiers an edge in battle. The emperor funded the work of Henri Sainte-Claire Deville, who found a chemical method for obtaining pure aluminum, but it was still a slow process. An often repeated story goes that Napoleon III, frustrated with progress on aluminum, had much of France’s stock melted down and turned into cutlery. He and his honored guests used aluminum utensils, while everyone else at the imperial dinner table made do with gold.
In 1884, when the Washington Monument was completed, it was capped with a large casting of aluminum. The capping ceremony and the dedication of the monument “were given front-page publicity in the nation’s newspapers and the aluminum point or apex was creditably described,” according to a 1995 article published in the journal of the Minerals, Metals & Materials Society. “Hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of people who had never before even heard about aluminum now knew what it was.”
At the time, a pound of aluminum was worth $16 ($419 in today’s dollars).
Two years later, a commercially viable method for extracting aluminum from ore was discovered, and by 1889 the price had fallen to $2 per pound. Within 10 years of commercial refining, it plummeted to just 50 cents a pound.
The modern method of obtaining aluminum was discovered simultaneously by two young scientists working independently on different continents.
In 1886, two men, both 22 years of age — one working in Ohio and the other in northwestern France — developed the modern method for producing aluminum metal.
American Charles Martin Hall went to work after being inspired by a lecture at Oberlin College in which his chemistry professor pronounced that the discoverer of a practical way to produce aluminum “will bless humanity and make a fortune for himself.”
Frenchman Paul Héroult was working on the same problem.
At nearly the same time, the two men hit upon the same answer: electricity, and lots of it.
Still used today, this is how their method works: Alumina from bauxite is dissolved in another mineral, cryolite, at 1,832 degrees Fahrenheit. The molten mixture is poured into a specially designed vat, and vast amounts of electricity are passed through it. The process causes aluminum metal to condense at the bottom of the vat.
The two men fought over ownership of the process they developed to smelt aluminum from bauxite ore. Héroult filed for his patent six weeks before Hall, but the American was able to prove (thanks possibly to notes kept by his sister, Julia Brainerd Hall) that he had actually made the discovery a few weeks before his rival. Ultimately, the two men settled their dispute and became friends.
In 1888, Hall co-founded the Pittsburgh Reduction Co. to produce aluminum. The company later became the aluminum giant Alcoa. The following year, Héroult scaled up the process in France.
The two men died the same year, in 1914, both age 51.
The development of the Hall-Héroult process, as it came to be known, was a major milestone in the Industrial Revolution. But it has also carried an environmental cost: The electricity needed produces large quantities of greenhouse gases. Aluminum production alone is responsible for about 1% of global emissions, according to estimates.
The availability of aluminum at the turn of the 20th century spurred on the age of flight and the Space Age.
Uses for Aluminum
The strength and light weight of aluminum is perfect for aerospace applications.
Aluminum allows designers to build a plane that is as light as possible, can carry heavyloads, uses the least amount of fuel and is impervious to rust. In modern aircraftmanufacture, aluminum is used everywhere. The Concorde, which flew passengers atover twice the speed of sound for 27 years, was built with an aluminum skin.
-Historyof Aluminum in the Aerospace Industry | Metal Super…
27% of all aluminum consumed occurs in the transportation industry, according to Aluminum Leader. This chemical element in the boron group is characterized by a silver-white color and soft, ductile texture. While it’s used in many different applications, one of the most common is aerospace. In fact, aluminum is one of the most common materials used in the construction of airplanes. So, why is aluminum used for this purpose instead of steel or other materials?
Some of the first airliners weren’t made of metal, but instead were made of wood. Although cheap and readily available, wood has a serious flaw that made it hazardous in airplanes: it rotted. There was one instances in which a wooden airliner crashed, killing everyone on board. The cause of the crash was later found to be rotten wood. This prompted manufacturers to quickly phase out wood in favor of metal.
Aluminum is the perfect material to use when manufacturing airplanes, thanks in part to its unique properties and characteristics. It’s strong, lightweight, predictable and inexpensive. Steel and iron are both stronger than aluminum, but strength alone isn’t enough to justify its use in aerospace manufacturing. The problem with steel and iron is its weight. Both of these metals are much heavier than aluminum — and too much weigh restricts an airplane’s ability to takeoff and fly.
It’s estimated that up to 80% of the materials used in modern-day aircraft is aluminum. The Wright brothers used a steel engine in their early-model Flyer plane, which was not only heavy but lacked the power necessary for takeover. As a result, they acquired a special engine made of cast aluminum, which allowed their Flyer-1 to takeoff with ease.
There are several different types of aluminum used in aerospace engineering, some of which include the following:
Aluminum 2024
Aluminum 3003
Aluminum 5052
Aluminum 6061
Aluminum 7075
Note: the number refers to the aluminum’s “grade.”
Of course, aluminum isn’t the only metal used to manufacture airplanes. Carbon-alloy steel is often used for his application as well. When carbon is added to steel, it becomes stronger and more resistant to rust and corrosion. Titanium is another metal that’s commonly used in aerospace engineering. It’s strong, lightweight, and naturally resistant to corrosion. Some companies alloy titanium with iron or manganese to construct the frame and engines for airplanes. These use of these metals, however, is typically less than that of aluminum. Aluminum isn’t the strongest metal, but it maintains a perfect balance of strength and low weight that make it ideal for airplanes.
The metal used and subsequent study
The object was taken to the Archaeological Institute of Cluj-Napoca for metallographic analysis where it was discovered that it was made from a complex alloy consisting 12 different elements.
It was then taken to a laboratory in Lausanne, Switzerland, to verify its composition, showed that the artifact was constituted mostly by aluminum (89%), with the minor participation of 11 other metals in specific proportions.
The thick layer of oxide of a millimeter of thickness that covered of even form to the block helped to date the antiquity of this in about 400 years. However, the geological layer in which it was found (Pleistocene) suggests that it already existed some 20,000 years ago in the past.
Florin Gheorghita, had the opportunity to examine the report and the analysis carried out under the direction of Dr. Niederkorn of the Institute for the Study of Nonmetallic Metals and Minerals (ICPMMN), located in Magurele, Romania, stressed in that it is composed of an extremely complex metal alloy.
Gheorghita states that the alloy is composed of 12 different elements, of which the percentage of aluminum volume (89%) has also been established. It also identified the presence of copper (6.2%), silicon (2.84%), zinc (1.81%), lead (0.41%), Laguna (0.33%), zirconium (0, 2%), cadmium (0.11%), nickel (0.0024%), cobalt (0.0023%), bismuth (0.0003%), silver (0.0002%), and gallium (in trace amounts).
People! these are extremely odd material and unusual combinations to have in an aluminum alloy. To say that it is unique is putting it mildly. What kind of mad scientist thought up this combination?
As I have often stated previously, factories don’t just throw what ever alloy of aluminum together and use it. Like steel, copper, bronze and zinc there are specific alloys that are regulated world-wide and used for certain purposes. Thus, by comparing the alloy composition of this object with available alloys “on the books” we can identify many aspects of this object.
We can identify it’s function.
We can identify what nation made it.
We might even be able to identify what smelter factory made the billet.
Isn’t industrial forensics fascinating?
Aluminum-Copper Alloy
The first thing that we note is that it’s most important alloying element is copper.
And from from this we can help determine what the possible function of the pawl was.
Copper has been the most common alloying element almost since the beginning of the aluminum industry, and a variety of alloys in which copper is the major addition were developed.
Most of these alloys fall within one of the following groups:
Cast alloys with 5% Cu, often with small amounts of silicon and magnesium.
Cast alloys with 7-8% Cu, which often contain large amounts of iron and silicon and appreciable amounts of manganese, chromium, zinc, tin, etc.
Cast alloys with 10-14% Cu. These alloys may contain small amounts of magnesium (0.10-0.30% Mg), iron up to 1.5%, up to 5% Si and smaller amounts of nickel, manganese, chromium.
Wrought alloys with 5-6% Cuand often small amounts of manganese, silicon, cadmium, bismuth, tin, lithium, vanadium and zirconium. Alloys of this type containing lead, bismuth, and cadmium have superior machinability.
Durals, whose basic composition is 4-4.5% Cu, 0.5-1.5% Mg, 0.5-1.0% Mn, sometimes with silicon additions.
Copper alloys containing nickel, which can be subdivided in two groups: the Y alloy type, whose basic composition is 4% Cu, 2% Ni, 1.5% Mg; and the Hyduminiums, which usually have lower copper contents and in which iron replaces some of the nickel.
In most of the alloys in this group aluminum is the primary constituent and in the cast alloys the basic structure consists of cored dendrites of aluminum solid solution, with a variety of constituents at the grain boundaries or interdendritic spaces, forming a brittle, more or less continuous network of eutectics.
Wrought products consist of a matrix of aluminum solid solution with the other constituents dispersed within it. Constituents formed in the alloys can be divided in two groups: in the soluble ones are the constituents containing only one or more of copper, lithium, magnesium, silicon, zinc; in the insoluble ones are the constituents containing at least one of the more or less insoluble iron, manganese, nickel, etc.
The type of soluble constituents formed depends not only on the amount of soluble elements available but also on their ratio.
Available copper depends on the iron, manganese and nickel contents; the copper combined with them is not available.
Copper forms (CuFe)Al6 and Cu2FeAl7, with iron, (CuFeMn)Al6 and Cu2Mn3Al20 with manganese, Cu4NiAl, and several not too well known compounds with nickel and iron.
The amount of silicon available to some extent controls the copper compounds formed.
Silicon above 1% favors the FeSiAl5, over the iron-copper compounds and (CuFeMn)3Si2Al15, over the (CuFeMn)Al6 and Cu2Mn3Al20 compounds.
Similarly, but to a lesser extent, available silicon is affected by iron and manganese contents. With the Cu:Mg ratio below 2 and the Mg:Si ratio well above 1.7 the CuMg4Al6 compound is formed, especially if appreciable zinc is present. When Cu:Mg > 2 and Mg:Si > 1.7, CuMgAl2 is formed.
If the Mg:Si ratio is approximately 1.7, Mg2Si and CuAl2 are in equilibrium.
With the Mg:Si ratio 1 or less, Cu2Mg8Si6Al5, is formed, usually together with CuAl2.
When the copper exceeds 5%, commercial heat treatment cannot dissolve it and the network of eutectics does not break up. Thus, in the 10-15% Cu alloys there is little difference in structure between the as-cast and heat treated alloys.
Magnesium is usually combined with silicon and copper. Only if appreciable amounts of lead, bismuth or tin are present, Mg2Sn, Mg2Pb, Mg2Bi3 can be formed.
The effect of alloying elements on density and thermal expansion is additive; thus, densities range from 2 700 to 2 850 kg/m3, with the lower values for the high-magnesium, high-silicon and low-copper alloys, the higher for the high-copper, high-nickel, high-manganese and high-iron contents.
Many of the cast alloys and aluminum-copper-nickel alloys are used for high-temperature applications, where creep resistance is important. Resistance is the same whether the load is tensile or compressive.
Wear resistance is favored by high hardness and the presence of hard constituents. Alloys with 10-15% Cu or treated to maximum hardness have very high wear resistance.
Silicon increases the strength in cast alloys, mainly by increasing the castability and thus the soundness of the castings, but with some loss of ductility and fatigue resistance, especially when it changes the iron-bearing compounds from FeM2SiAl8 or Cu2FeAl7, to FeSiAl5.
Magnesium increases the strength and hardness of the alloys, but, especially in castings, with a decided decrease in ductility and impact resistance.
Iron has some beneficial strengthening effect, especially at high temperature and at the lower contents (< 0.7% Fe).
Nickel has a strengthening effect, similar to that of manganese, although more limited because it only acts to reduce the embrittling effect of iron. Manganese and nickel together decrease the room-temperature properties because they combine in aluminum-manganese-nickel compounds and reduce the beneficial effects of each other. The main effect of-nickel is the increase in high-temperature strength, fatigue and creep resistance.
Titanium is added as grain refiner and it is very effective in reducing the grain size. If this results in a better dispersion of insoluble constituents, porosity and nonmetallic inclusions, a decided improvement in mechanical properties results.
Lithium has an effect very similar to that of magnesium: it increases strength, especially after heat treatment and at high temperatures, and there is a corresponding decrease in ductility. Zinc increases the strength but reduces ductility.
Hiduminium
The Hiduminium alloys or R.R. alloys are a series of high-strength, high-temperature aluminium alloys, developed for aircraft use by Rolls-Royce (“RR”) before World War II.
The name Hi–Du-Minium is derived from that of High Duty Aluminium Alloys.
In 1934 the Reynolds Tube Co. began production of extruded structural components for airframes, using R.R.56 alloy supplied by High Duty Alloys.
A new purpose-built plant was constructed at their works in Tyseley, Birmingham.
In time, the post-war Reynolds company, already known for its steel bicycle frame tubes, would attempt to survive in the peacetime market by supplying Hiduminium alloy components for high-end aluminium bicycle cranks and brakes.
The Duralumin alloys had already demonstrated high-strength aluminium alloys. Y alloy‘s virtue was its ability to maintain high strength at high temperatures. R.R alloys were developed by Hall & Bradbury at Rolls-Royce, partly to simplify the manufacture of components using them. A deliberate heat treatment process of multiple steps was used to control their physical properties.
Hiduminium Alloy range
A range of alloys were produced in the R.R.50 range. These could be worked by casting or forging, but they were not intended for rolling as sheet or general machining from bar stock.
Low-creep forging alloy for rotating impellers and compressors
R.R. 59
Forged piston alloy
The number of alloys expanded to support a range of applications and processing techniques. At the Paris Airshow of 1953, High Duty Alloys showed no less than eight different Hiduminium R.R. alloys: 20, 50, 56, 58, 66, 77, 80, 90. Also shown were gas turbine compressor and turbine blades in Hiduminium, and a range of their products in the Magnuminium alloy series.
R.R.58, also Aluminum 2618, comprising 2.5 copper, 1.5 magnesium, 1.0 iron, 1.2 nickel, 0.2 silicon, 0.1 titanium and the remainder aluminum, and originally intended for jet engine compressor blades, was used as the main structural material for the Concorde airframe, supplied by High Duty Alloys, it was also known as AU2GN to the French side of the project.
Later alloys, such as R.R.66, were used for sheet, where high strength was needed in an alloy capable of being worked by deep drawing. This became increasingly important with the faster jet aircraft post-war, as issues such as transonic compressibility became important. It was now necessary for an aircraft’s covering material to be strong, not merely the spar or framing beneath.
R.R.350, a sand-castable high temperature alloy, was used
In terms of composition, Y alloy typically contains 4% of copper and 2% of nickel. R.R. alloys reduce each of these by half to 2% and 1%, and 1% of iron is introduced.
So in comparison with the Pawl, we see that it’s composition in not a Y-alloy in the Hiduminium alloy family. The material used in the Pawl is an “aircraft structural grade aluminum alloy“, but it is not in common use as far as I can determine.
The copper percentage used, and the other alloying elements tells us that the material selection of this part migrated towards the need for ease of machining and finishing. And a look at the complex shape of this part, with curved, and convex surfaces, reinforces this conclusion. This part was cast, and then machined to exacting tolerances to match it’s complex geometry.
This particular grade of material is designed for high temperature applications. And since it is designed to pivot inside a mechanical mechanism, it appears that it is associated with either an engine component or landing gear.
So at least we know what it is not. It is not a hammer or utility part from a tractor. These parts tend to be made out of steel, or iron.
And we know what it is; it is a part used in an aircraft. It’s unique and complex geometry tells us that this was a structural component that fit within a mechanism with other precision parts. The presence of a machined hole tells us that there was a pivoting function of this item, and the presence of the second hone on the concave surface indicates that it mated with another part in some kind of sub-assembly geometry.
Abrasions on the surface
In 1995, a Romanian researcher, Florian Gheorghita, came across the artifact in the basement of the History Museum of Transylvania. The wedge was tested once more. This time in two different laboratories: the Archaeological Institute of Cluj-Napoca and an independent Swiss laboratory.
The tests confirmed the results reached by Fischinger and Niederkorn.
Gheorghita wrote in the Ancient Skies publication where he asked an aeronautical engineer about the artifact’s studies.
The engineer pointed out the configuration and hole drilled in the wedge and claimed that a pattern of abrasions and scratches on the metal led him to believe that it was part of an airplane landing gear.
For the Statists
Since this pawl is evidently an aircraft part, and the use of aluminum in aircraft began in the 1930’s, it is possible that this is part of a contemporaneous aircraft strut that somehow found it’s way to Romania over the years.
And somehow, it aged unusually rapidly, with surface corrosion of a substantial amount to a substantial degree by sandy soil.
And the design of the strut was somehow very elaborate and unusual for the aircraft pointing to some kind of advanced experimental design, for after all it wasn’t until the 1990’s that custom aluminum forgings of complex curved geometry started to find it’s way into mass production.
And it was truly a coincidence that it wound up in a batch of mastodon bones.
You can believe this narrative if it makes you feel better.
Conclusion
If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, waddles like a duck and tastes like a duck… it’s a duck. The only thing is that the particular species of a duck is new and unknown.
A machine, probably an aircraft, lost a part of it’s retractable landing gear around one million years ago near the Black Sea. The local proto-humanoids at that time, probably a species similar to Homo Habilis found the part and decided that it made a great hand tool. They used it to smash open the bones of the mastodons that they hunted at the time, and in the excitement of eating and engorging themselves forgot about the item and left it with the carcass.
Then, sometime in the 1970’s, the remains of the meal with the aluminum pawl was unearthed together during the construction of a road.
Who flew the aircraft, or what it was doing when it lost it’s part is unknown.
I do not know if it was “little green men”, articulated mastodons, or an unknown species of proto-humans who manufactured this part. What we do know is that they knew their metallurgy, they were able to design, and machine adeptly, and had the ability to fly in aircraft that encountered high temperature extremes.
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Think about it. What benefit does the United States Federal Government provide that the State governments cannot?
And, is that benefit worth the extra multiple layers of taxation?
I strongly believe that it is not worth it at all. The United States today is an out of control corrupt empire, and almost everything it does benefits a mere handful of people, while Joe and Suzy Average derives very little benefit. I would like to expound on this, through the lens of history.
The following article; “The Antifederalists Were Eerily Prophetic” is a most excellent article from the Mises Institute. Written 17NOV19. All credit to the author; Gary M. Galles.
The Antifederalists Were Eerily Prophetic
What the Antifederalists predicted would be the results of the 1776 Constitution turned out to be true…
Most school kids are left with the impression that the US
Constitution was the inevitable follow-up to the Declaration of
Independence and the war with King George. What they miss out on is the
exciting debate that took place after the war and before the
Constitution, a debate that concerned the dangers of creating a federal
government at all.
The Antifederalist Movement
Everyone knows about the Federalists who pushed the Constitution. But far less known are the Antifederalists who warned with good reason against the creation of a new centralized government, and just after so much blood had been spilled getting rid of one.
The first of the Antifederalist Papers appeared in 1789.
The Antifederalists were opponents of ratifying the US Constitution as (they feared) it would create what would become an overbearing central government.
What the Antifederalists predicted would be the results of the Constitution turned out to be true in most every respect.
As the losers in that debate, they are largely overlooked today. But that does not mean they were wrong or that we are not indebted to them.
Those that fight the Deep State are antifederalists.
Confusing nomenclature.
In many ways, the group has been misnamed.
Federalism refers to the system of decentralized government. This group defended states’ rights—the very essence of federalism—against the Federalists, who would have been more accurately described as Nationalists. Nonetheless, what they predicted would be the results of the Constitution turned out to be true in most every respect.
The Antifederalists warned us that the cost Americans would bear in both liberty and resources for the government that would evolve under the Constitution would rise sharply.
That is why their objections led to the Bill of Rights, to limit that tendency.
Their Oppositions to the Constitution
Antifederalists opposed the Constitution on the grounds that its checks on federal power would be undermined by expansive interpretations…
… of promoting the “general welfare” (which would eventually be claimed for every law)…
… and the “all laws necessary and proper” clause (which would be used to override limits on delegated federal powers)…
… thus creating a federal government with unwarranted and undelegated powers that were bound to be abused.
One could quibble with the mechanisms the Antifederalists predicted would lead to constitutional tyranny.
For instance, they did not see that the Commerce Clause would come to be called “the everything clause” in law schools...
...justifying almost any conceivable federal intervention...
...because the necessary distortion of its meaning was so great even Antifederalists couldn’t imagine the government could get away with it.
It merits remembering the Antifederalists’
prescient arguments and the virtual absence of modern Americans who
share their concerns.
And they could not have foreseen how the 14th Amendment and its interpretation would extend federal domination over the states after the Civil War.
But despite that, it is very difficult to argue with their conclusions in light of the current reach of our government, which doesn’t just intrude upon, but often overwhelms Americans today.
We need to listen to the Anti-federalist argument.
Therefore, it merits remembering the Antifederalists’ prescient arguments…
… and how unfortunate is the virtual absence of modern Americans who share their concerns.
One of the most insightful of the Antifederalists was Robert Yates, a New York judge who, as a delegate to the Constitutional Convention, withdrew because the convention was exceeding its instructions.
Yates wrote as Brutus in the debates over the Constitution.
Given his experience as a judge, his claim that the Supreme Court would become a source of almost unlimited federal overreaching was particularly insightful.
Expanded Judicial Power
Brutus asserted that the Supreme Court envisioned under the Constitution would become a source of massive abuse…
… because they were beyond the control “both of the people and the legislature,” …
…and not subject to being “corrected by any power above them.”
When the opportunity arises the corrupt officials will spring into action and restricts the rights of Americans so that they can gain personally.
As a result, he objected to the fact that its provisions justifying the removal of judges didn’t extend to rulings that went beyond their constitutional authority…
…thus, leading to judicial tyranny.
Brutus argued that when constitutional grounds for making rulings were absent…
… the Court would create grounds “by their own decisions.”
He thought that the power it would command would be so irresistible that the judiciary would use it to make law, manipulating the meanings of arguably vague clauses to justify it.
America today.
Expanded judicial power would empower justices to shape the federal government however they desired.
The Supreme Court would interpret the Constitution according to its alleged “spirit”…
… rather than being restricted to just the “letter” of its written words (as the doctrine of enumerated rights, spelled out in the 10th Amendment, would require).
Further, rulings derived from whatever the court decided its spirit was would effectively “have the force of law,”…
… due to the absence of constitutional means to “control their adjudications” and “correct their errors.”
This constitutional failing would compound over time in a “silent and imperceptible manner,” through precedents that build on one another.
Expanded judicial power would empower justices to shape the federal government however they desired…
… because the Supreme Court’s constitutional interpretations would control the effective power…
…power vested in government and its different branches.
That would hand the Supreme Court ever-increasing power, in direct contradiction to Alexander Hamilton’s argument in Federalist 78 that the Supreme Court would be “the least dangerous branch.”
Judicial Tyranny
Brutus predicted that the Supreme Court would adopt “very liberal” principles of interpreting the Constitution.
This is America today.
He argued that there had never in history been a court with such power and with so few checks upon it…
… giving the Supreme Court “immense powers”…
…powers that were not only unprecedented, but perilous for a nation founded on the principle of consent of the governed.
This is America today.
Given the extent to which citizens’ power to effectively withhold their consent from federal actions has been eviscerated, it is hard to argue with Brutus’s conclusion.
Brutus accurately described both [1] the cause (the absence of sufficient enforceable restraints on the size and scope of the federal government) and [2] the consequences (expanding burdens and increasing invasions of liberty) of what would become the expansive federal powers we now see all around us.
We need to understand their arguments and apply them to a NEW Constitution, if there is to be any hope of restraining the government to the powers it was actually granted in the Constitution.
Today
It’s well past time for a change.
But today, Brutus would conclude that he had been far too optimistic.
The federal government has grown exponentially larger than he could ever have imagined…
In part because he was writing when only direct, e.g., excise taxes and the small federal government they could finance were possible before the 16th Amendment opened the way for a federal income tax in 1913.
…far exceeding its constitutionally enumerated powers, despite the Bill of Rights’ constraints against it.
The result burdens citizens beyond his worst nightmare
The rise and fall of America.
Conclusion
The judicial tyranny that was accurately and unambiguously predicted by Brutus and other Antifederalists shows that in essential ways, they were right and that modern Americans still have a lot to learn from them.
We need to understand their arguments and take them seriously now, if there is to be any hope of restraining the federal government. Constraining it precisely to the limited powers it was actually granted in the Constitution. This is absolutely necessary given its current tendency to accelerate its growth well beyond enumerated Constitutional limits.
In my mind, the first step to controlling the out-of-control beast is to reestablish State sovereignty. Then, through concentrated and systematic efforts, starve the beast. Allow it to whither and die on the vine.
If Americans are unable to control this raging nasty beast, the rest of the world will need to call Animal Control to put it down, and that will certainly not be a pleasant event to witness.
This is America today. Look around you. The rest of the world is moving forward, and the enormous American empire remains dark and immovable.
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In this article we look at the place that China has carved out for itself in the world. Rather than repeating the American mainstream press narratives, we just present the charts, facts and figures and let them do all the talking. China is more than a growing nation. Today it is a predominant nation that is in the process of successfully eclipsing the United States as a global leader.
What I want to do is just present the facts, and let the reader come to their own conclusions.
Reichert and Bognar are clearly on the side of the workers, both American and Chinese, yet their film is no Michael Moore polemic. It's an old-school observational documentary in the very best sense of the term. They don't approach the Fuyao story with a thesis, don't dehumanize the Chinese, don't tell us what to think. Working with 1,200 hours of footage — heroically edited by Lindsay Utz — they have amazing access to a complex economic reality that is touchingly hard on workers.
- Work Cultures Clash When A Chinese Company Reopens An 'American Factory'
I am posting this on the eve of the 70th anniversary of the Communist Chinese nation. It’s a really, really big event out here. To quote one of my favorite presidents; “It’s bigly great!“.
Introduction
A vast majority of Americans have absolutely no clue how advanced China has become.
You don’t need to take my word for it. All you need to do is take a gander at the comments on social media. It’s a recycled bunch of “off the cuff”, dismissive nonsense that has been spewing forth from the mainstream media outlets for the last thirty years.
Many of the comments are all “boiler plate” smug nonsense. A quick word here, a phrase there, a snide comment. No serious discussion aside from “I have an engineering friend that visited China a few years ago and he reported it was a dump.“
If you hop on to any of the American social media platforms, especially (for some reason) the conservative platforms, you will discover such comments as…
“China is 100 years behind”
“All Chinese products are crap”
“China can’t innovate”
“It’s a communist, poor, polluted country”
“It’s infrastructure is collapsing”
…not to forget the specific “issues” that are all boilerplate responses…
“…cross removal on churches…”
“…eating dogs and cats…”
“…Tiananmen square massacre…”
“…ghost cities…”
“…One child policy…”
“…Uyghur Muslims in concentration camps!”
“…Chinese people long for democracy…”
… and, of course, the most popular theme is…
“China’s economy is about to collapse.”
It’s hard to change these opinions, since those people reinforce their biases by gleefully consuming and sharing only anti-China articles.
Anything even remotely positive about China is attacked as “Chinese propaganda.”
CNN reports on killer hornets in China. Yikes! But also places Hong Kong in South America. What is the funniest thing about this is that not one American noticed the geographical error. They were all far too busy worrying about giant zombie-like killer hornets! If I ever come across giant zombie killer hornets, I will write about it. I promise!
The truth is that America media has created an echo chamber that boxes Americans in. It holds them in a state of near constant fear, so that others (often powerful multinational corporations) can manipulate them for profit and personal gain. This is not good. This is quite awful. The reason that this is dangerous, and awful is because…
The American government requires an alert and well-informed citizenry to function properly.
Do a picture / image search for “dogs in china”. One is a United States search engine; Bing. The other is a Chinese search engine; Baidu.
Now look at the difference in the photos found. Big difference indeed.
If you search using American search engines, and American web sites you
will get the idea that the Chinese hates dogs. You would get the idea
that they eat them and treat them brutally.
The
photo results when using an American search engine (Bing) for the term
“Dogs in China”. Pretty terrible. Eh? The Chinese must really HATE dogs.
Don’t you think?
When the real truth is that the Chinese love dogs like their very own
children. They dress them up in clothes, including socks and shoes.
(Even my dog Shao Pi has sock, shoes, a coat, underwear, sunglasses, a
cap and his very own backpack.) They have hairstyles and perms that they
give the dogs. They groom them in pet salons, and offer them high-end
doggie hotel accommodations, complete with dog-friendly television
shows. It is a completely stark mind-blowing difference.
Yet, you know you would think that the US media would WANT to show
this bizarre behavior to the American public. It is, after all,
newsworthy. But they don’t. Anything that shows China in a positive
light is suppressed.
The
photo results when you use a Chinese search engine (Baidu) for the
search term “Dogs in China”. You know, the Chinese really love their
dogs and treat them as children.
This ignorance is dangerous
This potent mix of ignorance and hubris is also precisely why western corporations acted like they have towards China. They gladly and voluntarily shared their intellectual property (IP) with their Chinese joint-venture partners. They had nothing to fear from a “back-woods”, “third-rate”, “third world”, “shit hole” country.
So they just gave away their intellectual secrets. The Chinese were “too backward”, “not progressive enough”, a “third world shithole” and would never grow to be competitive.
It's like a 12 year old boy being "edged on" to wrestle with a grizzly bear. He doesn't know any better, and all his "friends" are telling him to "go ahead, you can do it".
But, you know, the grizzly bear won't play. And the boy, in his ignorance, will be literally eaten alive. And the friends, the very ones that edged him on, will scurry for the hills in fear and terror.
Ah. American industry was so strong, so powerful, so invincible. There was nothing that they couldn’t do, and nothing that they were afraid of.
So they gleefully shared American technology and “know how” with their Chinese counterparts.
The American government requires an alert and well-informed citizenry to function properly.
It’s silly in hindsight. The term “forced technology transfer” was invented retroactively, and only after Chinese corporations started threatening western profits.
Huawei has overtaken Apple, Nokia and Ericsson in smartphones, 5G and telecom infrastructure.
BYD manufactures more electric vehicles than Tesla.
Alibaba and Tencent process 50x more mobile payments than the US.
The most valuable (ByteDance) and the most innovative (Meituan) startups are Chinese.
But all this is disguised, camouflaged, hidden or obfuscated by ignorance and a lack of useful comparative measurements. For instance, if you judge the usefulness of a automobile steering wheel by the same characteristics as a buggy-whip, you will end up being misinformed as towards utility, usefulness, and quality.
We are often deceived by our ignorance.
Let’s look at where China is today, where it is heading, and what it means. For ease of convenience, I have grouped the charts by utility and usefulness.
Group [A] Economic Advantage
Here we try to gauge a measure of economic advantage a normal and typical person might have in a given nation. Can people live, eat have babies and families in the nation without undue hardship? This can (potentially) be measured by a nation’s GDP.
In general, the greater the GDP, the greater the advantage the family might have relative to the rest of the world. It’s a reasonably fine general gauge.
In general, the greater the GDP, the greater the advantage the family might have relative to the rest of the world.
It is not, nor should it ever be, a comprehensive indicator of how successful a given nation might be in providing “opportunity” for it’s citizenry. Rather it is a general indicator for predicting relative average familial prosperity geographically on a national basis.
I argue that it is easy to misinterpret the values that the GDP represents. Therefore, it should be considered not as an absolute, but rather as a guideline as to the success of any given nation.
In this regard, it is clear that China is near equals with the United States in GDP ratios with some "wiggle room" in allowances for methodology considerations.
[A1] GDP per capita
We start with the GDP per capita. The good news here for Americans is that the American GDP per capita is untouchable. America has the largest GDP per capita in the world.
PercapitaGDP is a measure of the total output of a country that takes gross domestic product (GDP) and divides it by the number of people in the country. The percapitaGDP is especially useful when comparing one country to another, because it shows the relative performance of the countries.With the income approach, the GDP of a country is calculated as its national income plus its indirect business taxes and depreciation, as well as its net foreign factor income.
-Investipedia
It’s a measure of the NET AVERAGE success of the net average citizen in a specific nation.
It is computed using United States dollars. The rating is based on the amount of United States dollars a nation uses.
Thus, the United States, being the world’s largest user of United States dollars, would of course, have the highest GDP per capita in the world.
GDP per capita is a measure of the NET AVERAGE success of the net average citizen in a given nation. If a nation has a good GDP then the citizens are afforded the ability to start and launch their own business with the resources that they might have on hand.
Of course, this is a general indicator. Some people will be rich and some people will be poor. But the net average person in the target nation would be adequately described by this measurable.
Nations that have very rich individuals and very poor individuals might have a GDP-per-capita somewhere in the middle.
Nations that have an overall good standard of living for everyone (rich and poor) might have a GDP-per-capita somewhere at the top.
Nations that have a generally poor standard of living for the vast bulk of the population would have a GDP-per capita somewhere at the bottom.
The bad news about this indicator is that can be deceiving.
A nation can have a top GDP-per capita rating and still have most of it’s people living in poverty. This can happen when a handful of the ultra-rich controls the vast bulk of the wealth.
In itself, it’s not really useful simply because no nation (aside from the tiniest nations) are truly homogeneous. What is useful, however, is to use it in conjunction with other measurables. Then it becomes a useful tool to help predict future economics of nations.
When it comes to the top national economies globally, although the order may shift around slightly from one year to the next, the key players are usually the same. At the top of the list is the United States of America, which according to Investopedia, has been at the head of the table going all the way back to 1871.
However, as has been the case for a good few years now, China is gaining on the U.S., with some even claiming that China has already overtaken the U.S. as the world’s Number 1 economy.
Some things to watch out for in an over-reliance on the GDP-per-capita charts and tracking…
Calculations on GDP/capita are only valid for nations trading solely in US dollars.
Nations that trade in other currencies (either fully or partially) will pull their GDP-per-capita rating lower than their actual value calculated.
In 2012, nearly eight years ago, China conducted trade with 20% being in the Yuan, and 80% in the USD.
Presently we can expect that the percentage of international trade in the yuan / USD to be much higher in 2019. Thus, this fact alone will render any GDP-per-capita calculation meaningless for a nation such as China that trades in other currencies and commodities.
The GDP-per-capita value assigned for China is deceptively low. It assumes that 100% of national trade is conducted in United States Dollars. When in actuality, China trades in USD, yuan, petrol-dollars, and commodities.
[A2] PPP GDP
China is #1 in PPP GDP. It is been so since 2014 when it surpassed the US). PPP GDP is another indicator that is useful in measuring geographical “advantage” for families.
United States and China are the two largest economies of the world in both Nominal and PPP method. US is at top in nominal whereas China is at top in PPP since 2014 after overtaking US. Both country together share 40.75% and 34.27% of total world’s GDP in nominal and PPP terms, respectively in 2019. GDP of both country is higher than 3rd ranked country Japan (nominal) and India (PPP) by a huge margin. Therefore, only these two are in competition to become first.
[A3] Nominal GDP
America is #1 in nominal GDP.
China is #2 in nominal GDP ($13.5 trillion in 2018). And it’s as big as the next 4 countries combined! This nominal GDP, as long as it is associated with people who manufacture goods within a nation, can also be a useful indicator.
GDP is the total market value of all final goods and services produced in a country in a given year. In Nominal method, market exchange rates are used for conversion.
United States is largest economy of world at nominal (exchange rate) basis. With economy of around $17.4 trillion, United States holds a 22.53 percent share of global GDP in nominal terms.
GDP of United states is $7039 billion more than second ranked China.
China contributes 13.43% of total world economic output.
Despite loosing $303 billion in 2014, Japan is still at number 3. Japan is now ahead of Germany by $757 billion. Top ten countries are : United States, China, Japan, Germany, France, United Kingdom, Brazil, Italy, Russia and India.
-Statistic Times
United States and China contributes 35.96% of world’s GDP. Top 3 countries contributes 41.93% of world’s GDP. Top 5 countries shares 50.74% of world’s GDP. Top 10 countries contributes 65.3% of world’s GDP.
However, this can be deceiving. The rebranding of imported products can artificially inflate this value. Which, is exactly what has happened in the United States.
According to this indicator, every iPhone in the United States is manufactured in the United States simply because it is listed as a final good. But, this is not true. Every iPhone is actually manufactured in China. It is then shipped to the USA, stored in warehouses, and sold. The American company profits from this. But no American worker does. The Chinese worker does.
Remember…
GDP is the total market value of all final goods and services produced in a country in a given year.
I argue that if you were to subtract the imported final goods from this equation, that the nominal GDP for America would be half of what it is currently listed as. Thus, making China #1 in nominal GDP actual.
Group [B] Exports & Exported Products
A nation that manufactures things is able to provide labor and purpose for it’s citizenry. When people are safe, secure and providing a meaningful role in their community, they tend to be happy and satisfied with their social-economic position.
The export of products and manufactured items is an indicator of the value of the parts so made. This value can fall under one of three characteristics. Either it is of high quality, it is cheap, or it is made quickly.
On every level, China is superior in the manufacture, export, shipping and supply chain management of parts, things and assemblies all over the globe.
[B1] Exports
China is #1 in exports (been so since 2009 when it overtook Germany). This should not be a surprise to anyone.
China’s dominance in trade has been a key driver of this trade metamorphosis and economists at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have put out a report outlining the progress as well as some of the challenges confronting China as the economy continues to evolve.
[B2] Container Traffic
China is #1 in container traffic (40% of global market). This should not be a surprise to anyone.
Infographic on shipping container traffic from China compared to the United States.
[B3] Importation of products
America is the #1 importer of products.
China is the #2 importer of products. ($2.1 trillion) It is behind the United States in this role. Most of the products that China imports originate out of the United States.
This is a measure of the relative health of the consumer market. When people are buying things, the consumer market is healthy. As many raw materials are imported, such as metals, and oil, it is also a reflection of the health of a nations industrial might.
China is the #2 importer of products. ($2.1 trillion) It is behind the United States in this role.
China imports precious metals from Africa, oil and gas from the Middle East, and recyclable trash from the United States.
[B4] Manufacturing Value Added
China is #1 in manufacturing value added (been so since 2010 when China overtook it from the US, which had been #1 for the previous 110 years).
China is the world’s leader in the manufacture of value added parts, components and assemblies.
In layman’s terms, “value added” is the relative value of what you get for your money.
High value added; Movie + fresh buttered popcorn + icy cold soda + wide comfortable reclining seats + VIP discount coupons.
Low value added; Discount matinee movie in an non- air-conditioned theater.
Life is too short for cheap beer.
When a nation starts selling things that are low value added, they will offer generic products, discount products, and reduced value items. Conversely, when a nation sells high value things, they would rely on high quality and brand names to sell the products.
Value AddedInbusiness, thedifferencebetweenthesalepriceandtheproductioncostofaproductistheunitprofit. Ineconomics, thesumoftheunitprofit, theunitdepreciationcost, andtheunitlaborcostistheunitvalueadded. Summingvalueaddedperunitoverallunitssoldistotalvalueadded. Totalvalueaddedisequivalenttorevenuelessoutsidepurchases (ofmaterialsandservices).
- Wikipedia
Group [C] The Health of the National Currency
A healthy currency is one that goes a long way in purchasing things. Gold is considered a healthy currency for just this reason. It tends to always go up in value. Likewise, an unhealthy currency is one that loses value over time. Such as being subject to inflation.
China's currency is healthy. The Chinese government has taken great care in the husbanding of the currency and unlike the United States, did not hand over the financial management of the nations' economy to bankers (like the United States did with the Federal Reserve).
[C1] Foreign Exchange Reserves
China is #1 in foreign exchange reserves (>$3 trillion).
The more foreign exchange reserves a nation has, the greater the stability of it’s currency and it’s banking industry is. A strong forex means it is difficult for the nation to suffer through depressions, downturns and recessions.
Maybe President Trump should of thought about this before he tried to press the tariff issue with the Chinese. Eh?
China has the healthiest forex reserves in the world. The United States has the weakest (and most dangerous levels) of forex reserves, followed by the UK.
Foreign exchange reserves take the form of banknotes, deposits, bonds, treasury bills, and other government securities. Foreign exchange reserves are a nation’s backup funds in case of an emergency, such as a rapid devaluation of its currency.
Foreignexchangereserves (alsocalledforexreservesorFXreserves) arecashandotherreserveassetsheldbyacentralbankorothermonetaryauthoritythatareprimarilyavailabletobalancepaymentsofthecountry, influencetheforeignexchangerateofitscurrency, andtomaintainconfidenceinfinancialmarkets. Reservesareheldinoneormorereservecurrencies, nowadaysmostlytheUnitedStatesdollarandtoalesserextenttheeuro.
- Wikipedia
When you hold the debt of the United States, the USA government must pay you the interest on that debt. It’s a source of income for you.
Holding the debit of an other nation provides numerous benefits for the person holding the debt. One [1] your economy can ride out any fluctuation in the market by the success of another nation. [2] You can control the economy of another nation by buying or selling off your debt.
One of the most common concerns of the government is to earn lots of funds to be able to make everything in the vicinity of their country in its proper order. Due to these, governments are seen typically to have their debt from other countries that they are paying either through the use of their current income as well as the issuance of new bonds. When a country will be doing their debt monetization there is a possibility that the presence of inflation would appear. It is a process wherein the issuance of the debt to be able to finance all its spending and the printing of the money by the central back are observed.
Inflation is greatly connected with the so called quantitative easing in other countries to lessen the governments’ burdens when it comes to their debts. The highest scale of this particular type of condition was seen to be common in the US. They have the so called Federal balance sheet to determine the quantity of their debts from other countries. Federal Reserve will be the one in charge of handling and holding the of every US debt of the country.
-Brandon Gialle
China reclaims title as biggest foreign holder of US debt. The two countries account for more than a third of the total foreign ownership of US Treasury securities. Investors have been closely scrutinizing China’s ownership of Treasuries after the country spent a portion of its foreign exchange reserves last year to defend the renminbi.
Group [D] Global Partner to other Nations
A nation that is friends and supportive to other nations is one that can be relied upon when things go wrong. While the USA has been involved in wars all over the globe, China has been trying to build bridges, assist in economic development and offering educations to the poor around the world.
BeltandRoadInitiative (BRI) China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) (一带一路) isanambitiousprogrammetoconnectAsiawithAfricaandEuropevialandandmaritimenetworksalongsixcorridorswiththeaimofimprovingregionalintegration, increasingtradeandstimulatingeconomicgrowth.
- Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)
The Belt and Road Initiative is a grand plan to connect Asia with Europe and Africa in a monumental trade and infrastructure network. Aimed at promoting prosperity for countries across the world, it was proposed by the Chinese President Xi Jinping in 2013.
China calls it a “modern Silk Road” with plans to build six major economic corridors generating hundreds of thousands of jobs.
Apart from free trade, the plan would provide opportunities for peace and inclusiveness, said President Xi at the forum, adding that old models based on rivalry and diplomatic power games should be abandoned, reported Reuters.
There are various measures of being a good “global neighbor”. Here are some of them…
Rather than fight an endless stream of wars, China has decided that it would be a far better friend than an enemy to other nations. As such they are openly conducting relationships, trade and establishing trade routes so that the world within their sphere can prosper together.
[D1] Primary trading partner with most of the world.
China is the #1 trade partnerfor 130 countries (trade = exports + imports). And for 37 countries, China is also their #1 export destination (meaning, they sell the most goods to China).
In 2017, China major trading partner countries for exports were United States, Hong Kong, China, Japan, Korea, Rep. and Vietnam and for imports they were Korea, Rep., Japan, Other Asia, nes, United States and China.
[D2] Contribution to Global Growth
China is the #1 leader in contribution to global GDP growth for the past decade (25-35%, which is twice that of the US). That is, if the world GDP grows by $100, then $25-$35 comes from China.
China is expected to account for fully 73% of total growth of the so-called BRICS grouping of large developing economies.
[D3] Production of Construction Materials
China is by far, #1 in steel, cement, aluminum production (link, link, link). In three years (2012 – 2015), China used more cement than the US did in the entire 20th century (link)!
Check out these graphs that shows just how dominant China is in all these fields…
China dominates the world in the production of steel. No other nation or region of nations comes close.China dominates the world in the production of steel. No other nation or region of nations comes close.China dominates the world in the production of aluminum. No other nation or region of nations comes close.China currently produces over half of the world’s cement. Global cement production is expected to increase from 3.27 billion metric tons in 2010 to 4.83 billion metric tons in 2030. In China, the cement production in 2015 amounted to some 2.31 million tons.If you remember just one thing from this article, it would probably be this infographic.
[D4] China leads the world in the manufacture of automobiles.
China is #1 in manufacture of conventional cars (>26 million per year). In manufacturing, it is always the “large players” that will dominate the industry. They will set the trends, the styles, and the regulations.
How has China become such a dominant economic power? Part of the reason is its booming auto industry. To illustrate, the total number of autos sold last year in China was 24.6 million. This dwarfs total auto sales in the U.S. last year, which hit a record 17.5 million cars and trucks. In addition, SUV sales in China increased a whopping 52% in 2015. China’s auto industry is thriving and should provide stiff competition for U.S. auto manufacturers in the years ahead.
- Forbes
The Chinese automobile sector has experienced rapid growth over the past decade, with China recently becoming the world’s largest producer of automobiles. Given the steel-intensive nature of automobile production, the expansion of China’s automobile sector has seen it become an important end-user of steel. With the number of cars in China still very low relative to its large population, car sales are likely to remain at a high level for the foreseeable future; accordingly, Chinese car makers should remain a significant (and growing) source of demand for steel.
[D5] High-Technology manufacture
China is #2 in hi-tech manufacturing (Yeah, China isn’t just making rubber duckies anymore).
The narrative from the American mainstream media has always been that China can only copy. They cannot innovate.
This should be considered a specious argument as China has fully invented and implemented 5G technology, while American industry is still struggling on developing it.
People! You cannot copy something that hasn’t been invented yet.
5G3GPP's5GlogoIntroduced Late 2018 by the Chinese Huawei, 5Gisthefifthgenerationcellularnetworktechnology. Theindustryassociation3GPPdefinesanysystemusing "5GNR" softwareas "5G", adefinitionthatcameintogeneralusebylate 2018. OthersmayreservethetermforsystemsthatmeettherequirementsoftheITUIMT-2020. 3GPPwillsubmittheir5GNRtotheITU. Itfollows2G, 3Gand4Gandtheirrespectiveassociatedtechnologies.
A global power shift in the technology sector is underway. Decades ago, China was viewed as a mere imitator in the technology world. The international tech community regarded Chinese companies as more likely to copy western products than develop their own innovative ideas.
Group [E] Personal Success
It is the internal yearning of man to improve his lot. That includes his children and the lifestyle of his family. We look at ability to grow as a family in success as well as the ability for companies to grow and succeed. How does China stack up in this regard…
China is catching up fast, and has eclipsed the United States on various levels.
[E1] Billionaires
China is a close #2 in billionaires (about 400 billionaires). But that gap is closing fast.
When it is possible to go from “rags to riches” there is the ability to greatly improve one’s status in life.
China is a close #2 in billionaires (about 400 billionaires). But that gap is closing fast.
[E2] Millionaires
China is #1 in millionaires.
Step aside, American millionaires. Your Asian counterparts are now wealthier than you are. Asian millionaires now control more wealth than their peers in North America, Europe and other regions, according to a new World Wealth Report from Capgemini, a consulting group.
Asian millionaires saw their wealth jump by 9.9% in 2015, while poor performance in the equity markets in the United States and Canada slowed growth in North America to a sluggish 2.3% last year.
Step aside, American millionaires.
Your Asian counterparts are now wealthier than you are.
Asian millionaires now control more wealth than their peers in North America, Europe and other regions, according to a new World Wealth Report from Capgemini, a consulting group.
Asian millionaires saw their wealth jump by 9.9% in 2015, while poor performance in the equity markets in the United States and Canada slowed growth in North America to a sluggish 2.3% last year.
Of course, it is useful to be deceptive in this matter.
If you consider wealth to ONLY be measured in United States Dollars, and not in other currencies, gold, bitcoin, or in property, it would be Americans that would be the wealthiest. For they have the largest piles of money in the USD currency.
Of course, it is useful to be deceptive in this matter. If you consider wealth to ONLY be measured in United States Dollars, and not in other currencies, gold, bitcoin, or in property, it would be Americans that would be the wealthiest. For they have the largest piles of money in the USD currency.
It's sort of like saying that Americans eat the most delicious food in the world simply because America makes the most hamburgers. While not taking into account that there are other kinds of food.
When you try to judge the world on an American scale... USD, your results will be skewed in favor of the United States.
[E3] Stock Market
China is #2 stock market, by market cap (overtook Japan in 2014). Obviously the United States stock market is a major player in stock value and worth.
In 2003, even tiny Switzerland and sparsely populated Canada had larger stock markets than China. And India is coming on strong. It’s now home to 2.6 percent of the world’s total stock market value.
[E4] Fortune 500 Companies
China is #2 in representation in Global Fortune 500 companies. (And, it is actually #1 if Taiwan is included)
TheFortuneGlobal 500, alsoknownasGlobal 500, isanannualrankingofthetop 500 corporationsworldwideasmeasuredbyrevenue. ThelistiscompiledandpublishedannuallybyFortunemagazine. Until 1989, itlistedonlynon-USindustrialcorporationsunderthetitle "International 500" whiletheFortune 500 containedandstillcontainsexclusivelyUScorporations.
- Wikipedia
China is #2 in representation in Global Fortune 500 companies. (And, it is actually #1 if Taiwan is included)
[E5] Agriculture
China is #1 in most agricultural products — production of rice, wheat, potato, beer(!), tea, apple, strawberry, grapes and numerous other grains, vegetables and fruits. (link)
China leads the world in the production of rice.China leads the world in the production of beer.China leads the world in the production of wheat.China leads the world in the production of pork.China leads the world in the production of tea. Sorry Arkansas. You are going to have to tear down all your signs.
Group [F] Poverty and Middle Class
A good indicator on the general health of a nation is the size of it’s middle class. Nations that are stratified with a rich class, and a poor class but have a very small middle class will produce raw data that on the surface looks great, but in reality does not reflect the nation as a whole.
China's middle class is growing and dwarfs that of the West. They are also affluent, tech-savvy and travel internationally.
[F1] The Middle Class Population
China is #1 in Middle Class population (350 million in 2018; and it overtook the US in 2015).
Chinese middle class is huge and growing. It’s already far larger than what is found in the United States.China’s middle class is large and growing.The global pyramid of wealth. It’s all going to Asia. While the middle class in North America shrinks substantially.China has an enormous and growing middle class.The nineteenth century industrial revolution created a substantial Western European and American middle class. Today the same is happening in emerging markets. Over the next two decades, the global middle class is expected to expand by another three billion, from 1.8 billion to 4.9 billion, coming almost exclusively from the emerging world. In Asia alone, 575 million people can already count themselves among the middle class — more than the European Union’s total population,
[F2] Elimination of poverty
=> #1 in poverty elimination (800 million lifted out of extreme poverty)
[F3] On-line and electronic sales
China is #1 in online/e-commerce retail sales (In 2019 it was three times (3x) that of the US).
In the retailing business, it’s fairly common knowledge that China is home to the world’s most prolific online shoppers. Last year almost 419 million mainlanders made purchases via the Web, more than any other country, and they spent more online than consumers elsewhere by a wide margin ($672 billion, nearly twice U.S. online spending in 2015).
If these facts suggest to you that e-commerce in China has matured and growth is running out of steam as the country’s economy slows, think again. China retail consumption in general continues to increase briskly and online shopping in particular continues to boom. Analysts reckon this is due to a combination of potent demographic and cultural trends that show no signs of abating: the growing spending power of upper middle class and affluent households; the coming of age of a generation of college-educated consumers; rising aspirations among hundreds of millions of people in China’s less-developed cities and rural areas; a powerful shift away from shopping at brick-and-mortar stores to mobile e-commerce driven by widespread smartphone adoption.
Will China still be on top at the close of the decade? A recent forecast on worldwide e-commerce sales through 2019 by independent research firm eMarketer says yes, emphatically so.
-China will completely dominate e-commerce.
e-commerce transactions between China and other countries increased 32% to 2.3 trillion yuan ($375.8 billion) in 2012 and accounted for 9.6% of China’s total international trade. In 2013, Alibaba had an e-commerce market share of 80% in China.China dominates retail e-commerce sales by a significant factor.
[F4] Retail Market
China is #1 in the retail market of the world by 2019 ($5.6 trillion)
By 2018, the Chinese online fashion market is forecast to be larger than that of the USA and Europe combined. This according to the latest report from the Statista Digital Market Outlook. The analysis reveals, with turnover of 126 billion U.S. dollars in 2016, China is already by far the leader for online fashion but by 2018 this turnover is expected to reach 194 billion – eclipsing that of the USA and Europe. The biggest players in China are currently Tmall, JD and VIP.com.
China’s overall share of global luxury goods purchases declined slightly from 31% to 30%. Longer term, China remains an engine of growth for luxury goods as the country’s middle class continues to grow in size and purchasing power. The behavior of Chinese consumers epitomizes a larger global trend: the re-localization of luxury. In 2016, the growth of local luxury purchases exceeded that of tourist purchases by 5 percentage points, the first time that has happened since 2001.The luxury market value on the Chinese mainland is expected to hit 113 billion yuan ($18.07 billion) by the end of the year. Watches are expected to be among the hardest hit categories with a 5 percent drop in market value.
However, Chinese purchases worldwide reached 306 billion yuan with spending abroad rocketing by 31 percent.
More than 60 percent of consumption took place in overseas markets, driven by the depreciation of major foreign currencies, and dynamic overseas travel.
[F6] Luxury Automotive Market
China is #1 in the luxury car market (Example: 400,000 BMW’s manufactured and sold in China in 2017). Any one visiting China can attest to this. Bentley’s and Lamborghini’s are all pretty common in China. But, very rare in the United States.
China represents a significant proportion of market share for luxury brand automobiles.German automakers Audi, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz maintained their lead as the top performers in China’s luxury car market in the first half of 2014 as Mercedes-Benz continues to try to play catch-up to its two main rivals.
[F7] International Tourism
China is #1 in international tourism spending (In 2010, Chinese tourists spent half as much as Americans; and by 2017, China was spending twice as much as the US)
Revenue generated by outbound tourism from China continues to grow in 2018. The United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) found that spending from Chinese tourists abroad now makes up 21% of all tourism spending. In addition, each Chinese traveler spends on average more per trip than tourists from any other country. The impact of Chinese tourists on the luxury industry is thus remarkable. Retailers, hotels, restaurants and travel brands all need to adapt their products and services if they want to appeal to this new market segment.China’s outbound tourism boom is expected to remain the largest force in the global travel market over the next decade, with Chinese spending reaching US$255.4 billion by 2025.
This was the prediction of a recent report by economic forecasting firm Oxford Economics and credit card company Visa called “Mapping the Future of Global Travel and Tourism,” which says that this number will be the result of an 86 percent increase in Chinese travel spending in the next 10 years. The 2025 prediction will be up from $137 billion spent in 2015, keeping China far at the top of the list as the number one source of cross-border travel spending in the world. The staggering amount is expected to be almost double that of the United States’ second-place $134.1 billion spent by tourists abroad and larger than that of Germany, the UK, and Russia combined.
Group [G] Technology
The future of the world belongs to the nation that can harness, control and wield new and advanced technology. Increasingly it appears that China will wear this mantle.
China is investing in technology, spending money, time and effort towards AI, robotics, space exploration, and medical research. Meanwhile the United States is pushing for diversity improvements, Muslim outreach, and social programs.
China’s startup market had a good year in 2018, with close to 100 technology companies garnering a valuation of more than $1 billion.
Known as unicorns, the companies were led by eCommerce and video streaming services, the Financial Times reported, citing data from Hurun’s ranking of China’s top tech companies.
China’s startup market had a good year in 2018, with close to 100 technology companies garnering a valuation of more than $1 billion.
Known as unicorns, the companies were led by eCommerce and video streaming services, the Financial Times reported, citing data from Hurun’s ranking of China’s top tech companies. According to the report, Hurun, which also produces the annual rich list for China, found there are 186 Chinese tech startups that have valuations of more than $1 billion. In first place is Ant Financial, the digital payments affiliate of Alibaba. Among the video streaming startups, the Financial Times said ByteDance made the list. It runs the Toutiao news video and short video streaming company Douyin.
ByteDance, Tencent-backed short-video app Kuaishou, and Meicai, an online platform for farmers selling vegetables, were ranked the fastest-growing startups, with valuations that jumped 400 percent in 2018, reported the Financial Times. The report noted that internet services, medical and health companies, and education were the fastest growing sectors from a valuation perspective.
-PYMNTS
Beijing topped the list of cities with the most “unicorn” companies, with 54 startups according to the Hurun Greater China Unicorn Index 2017 released Dec 21.
A unicorn, by definition, is a startup company valued at more than $1 billion. The list surveyed 120 unicorn companies with a total estimated value of more than 3 trillion yuan ($458 billion) in China.
Shanghai took second position with 28 unicorns, and Hangzhou followed Shanghai with 13 unicorns.
Notably, the 13 unicorn companies in Hangzhou have a higher total estimated value than the 28 unicorns in Shanghai combined.
While investors in the West have carefully trimmed their stakes in startups and announced the end of the golden age of unicorns, China’s government-backed venture capital funds have amassed the world’s biggest startup pool, reports Bloomberg.
And it’s enormous—reaching almost 10 times the amount spent by venture capital firms on Chinese startups in 2015: $32.2 billion.
In bid to ease the slowing Chinese economy into a consumer-based rather than heavy industry-focused one, the country reportedly raised about 1.5 trillion yuan, or $231 billion, in state-backed venture funds through 2015, according to Zero2IPO.
That tripled its assets under management to $338 billion. The money, which is almost five times the amount raised by any other venture firm in the world in 2015, comes mostly from tax revenues or state backed loans, and is funneled into some 780 funds across the country.
China's 4G users touches 836 million. China hastheworld'slargest 4G network andisaimingtoadd 2 million 4G basestations, mainlyfortownshipsandvillages, by 2018. Alsobytheendofthefirstquarter, China had 310 millionusersof fixed-line broadband network, andnearly 80 percentofthemusedfiberbroadbandproducts.
-Economic Times
One of the main reasons China is ahead of the US is because of proactive government policies. The CTIA feels so strongly about this it even commissioned another research firm to further investigate the importance of winning at 5G.
“When countries lose global leadership in a generation of wireless, jobs are shed and technology innovation gets exported overseas... Conversely, leading the world in wireless brings significant economic benefits, as the U.S. has seen with its 4G leadership. These are the serious stakes that face American policymakers in the escalating global race to 5G.”
-Roger Entner, Founder of Recon Analytics.
Well you can’t argue with that can you? Here’s the 5G readiness chart according to whatever criteria they used.
Research commissioned by US wireless trade association CTIA reckons China is a bit ahead of Korea, the US and Japan when it comes to 5G readiness. The report, compiled by Analysis Mason, frames 5G as a global race – the implication being that whoever starts doing it in real life first will have a big advantage over everyone else.
China has the highest number of internet users in the world, with over 746 million users. China has a population of over one billion, and a vast internet network that has been expanded in recent years. Chinese internet users have nearly doubled in numbers over the past decade. The strongest increase has been among mobile internet users, who access the internet on smartphones, which is very popular in China.China owns the internet. Compared to the Chinese software companies, Google and Facebook, Twitter and all the rest are all small potatoes
[G5] Smartphone use
China is #1 in smartphones (Chinese brands have 40% of the global market)
China has the largest smartphone penetration in the world.
[G6] Use of solar, wind and hydro power.
China is #1 in solar, wind and hydroelectric power (link)
China has invested heavily in alternative energy sources. This includes solar, wind and hydro technologies.
[G7] Use of electric cars
China is #1 in electric cars – manufacturing and sales (link)
There’s no comparison. China is by far, the world leader in electric vehicles.
[G8] Drones
China is #1 in consumer drones (70% of global market). This is pretty much obvious when you just scan through the names and logos of those people making the drones. Heck! They are mostly Chinese.
China is #1 in consumer drones (70% of global market).
China is #1 in supercomputers (227 out of the 500 supercomputers are Chinese)
China has pulled way ahead of the US in the supercomputers. The share of TOP500 installations in China continues to rise, with the country now claiming 227 systems (45 percent of the total). The number of supercomputers that call the US home continues to decline.
I was talking the other day to a colleague about the phenomenon in Asia, India, Africa and South America taking place with mobile payments and the lack of take-up in the USA. Why is this, I wondered? Then got my answer, although it isn’t a singular factor but a combination of factors.
First, there are many payment methods already deployed and available for most American consumers including cash, check, credit or debit card, PayPal and more. Second, it is not just the choice of payment methods but also the breadth and depth of acceptance. For most US stores, their preferred payment method is cash or card, and that’s pretty much the same in Europe; whilst China’s stores all take QR codes. Third, there has to be a reason for consumers to change their payments behavior and the US has not created any yet; China’s red letter days made the difference when Tencent and Alibaba went head-to-head, and Singles Days and other events since have created the behavioral change. Finally, there has to be scale and support for change, and the USA doesn’t have it as there are too many financial providers with too many different interests. If the USA had Facebook and Amazon offering simple payments in apps, it might have taken off far faster than it has; but the fact that Tencent (800 million users) and Alibaba (540 million) pushed mobile payments hard into the Chinese consumers hands made the transformation easy.
This is why it surprises me that after all the hoo-hah razzamatazz announcements of Apple Pay that it turned out to be such a damp fizz. In fact, I claim it’s one of Apple’s failures. I don’t use it. I have no incentive to use it. I don’t like it. I don’t find it functional. In fact, I hate it.
I realized how much I dislike it when the new iPhone keeps bringing up Siri and Apple Pay rather than opening my apps when I press the home button. Then, when I want Apple Pay to come up, I have no idea how to get it. Then I realized it’s in my wallet, and then I realized the wallet is now just a digital representation of my card.
-Skinners Blog
China leads the world, by far…far… far in command of mobile payments.
Group [H] Infrastructure
A measure of how healthy a nation is can be determined by it’s infrastructure. How many new parks are made? What is the condition of bridges? How is the ease and availability of public transportation? High speed rail, the prices and extent of the lines? Here we can see that China outshines the world in these areas.
Compared to the United States, China has invested such an enormous amount of money and resources into infrastructure that simply dwarfs any efforts by the United States. They are so minuscule that they hardly seem worth mentioning in comparison with China.
[H1] Skyscraper construction
China is #1 in skyscrapers – more than half of all skyscrapers are in China (link)
China is the world leader in skyscraper construction.
China is #1 in high-speed railways or bullet trains (30,000 Km or 18,000 miles)
China leads the world in high speed rail. The value listed for the United States is an estimate. As of 1OCT19, only 15 miles of HST track has been laid down in the United States.
[H3] Global Infrastructure Projects
China is #1 in global infrastructure projects. China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) involves 152 countries and international organizations. (link)
Globally, China has been steadily increasing its official finance investments in other countries, but these flows are less concessional than that of other large players like the US. Consistent with speculation in popular media and policy circles, China is making big bets in the infrastructure sector, as the lion’s share of its investments globally between 2000 and 2014 were in energy (US$134.1 billion), transportation and storage (US$88.8 billion), telecommunications projects (US$16.9 billion) and mining, construction and industry (US$ 30.3 billion).
Seven of the top 10 recipients of Chinese “aid” (ODA) were in Africa, but its other official flows (OOF) are more geographically dispersed. Cote d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe, Cameroon, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Ghana collectively received US$23.3 billion in official development assistance from China between 2000 and 2014. Africa is less of a priority for China when it comes to its more commercial or diplomatically focused other official financing: Angola is the lone African country in the top ten recipients of Chinese OOF, receiving $13.4 billion.
- China’s financial statecraft: Winning Africa one Yuan at a time?
These survey results tell us that the substantial investments made by China in the infrastructure sector are indeed paying off in increased influence with world leaders. In comparing survey responses from 2014 and 2017, China is rapidly gaining ground when it comes to agenda-setting influence with policymakers in low- and middle-income countries. More on this is still to come, with AidData’s forthcoming publication analyzing the full survey results slated for April 2018.
So, how might we explain China’s rising influence? Money may not buy love, but it does give donors a seat at the table with policymakers in low- and middle-income countries. China holds most sway with leaders from countries that are heavily dependent on its grants and loans.
Beyond money, public diplomacy tools can work together with development assistance to amplify influence with African leaders. For example, China has more influence in countries where leaders had greater interaction with the Chinese Communist Party and less influence in countries that had more leaders educated in the US and a higher number of Fulbright scholars.
In addition to becoming the biggest produced of steel and aluminum, among many other things, the PRC has launched a number of huge infrastructure projects—topped by $25 billion Three Gorges Dam (a project originally dreamed of since imperial days).
But China still remains deeply conservative politically—it remains the only one of the ten major global economies not to be a multi-party democracy.
Under Mao, China sought to export revolution. Today it looks to deploy its massive cash reserves, spreading “soft power” around the globe. Throughout, the PRC insists that it’s pursuing a “peaceful rise” in search of a “harmonious world”.
-China in the 21st Century
Group [I] Science, Research & Development
Scientific development is how a nation can obtain a leadership role in the global economy. When ever a nation has technological leadership, it’s people prosper. This was true for Germany, Japan, and the Untied States. It is now true for China.
[I1] STEM field participation
China is #1 in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) college graduates (4x as many as the US)
With regard to STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) graduates, however, according to the OECD, in 2030, if the proportions of STEM graduates continue at 2012 levels, China and India will account for more than 60% of the OECD and G20 STEM graduates. Considering the BRIICS countries as a whole (Brazil, the Russian Federation, India, Indonesia, China and South Africa), it is estimated that they will produce three-quarters of the global STEM graduates by 2030. This is a significant shift away from the traditional aerospace manufacturing hubs in North America and Europe.
According to 2018 Science & Engineering Indicators, a report published by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), China has left the U.S. behind to become the largest producer of scientific articles. In 2016, China published more than 426,000 studies, which amounted to 18.6% of the publications indexed in Scopus (Elsevier’s database). The U.S., with 409,000 studies, is now positioned after China.
Over the last few years, the volume of publications in China has increased exponentially; China had been trailing the U.S. with regard to the number of publications. In June 2017, the Chinese National Center for Science and Technology Evaluation (NCSTE) and Clarivate Analytics, announced that China ranks third in the world in publishing academic papers that are a result of international collaboration.
-Editage Insights
China’s Scientific dominance is a done deal – Business Insider.
“The US continues to be the global leader in science and technology, but the world is changing,” says Maria Zuber, a geophysicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. As other nations increase their output, the United States’ relative share of global science activity is declining, says Zuber, who chairs the National Science Board, which oversees the NSF and produced the report. “We can’t be asleep at the wheel.”
The shifting landscape is already evident in terms of the sheer volume of publications: China published more than 426,000 studies in 2016, or 18.6% of the total documented in Elsevier’s Scopus database. That compares with nearly 409,000 by the United States. India surpassed Japan, and the rest of the developing world continued its upward trend.
-Nature
The international authorities overseeing the creation of a unified standard for 5G mobile technologies are expected to release its initial phase next year and the final phase in 2019, paving the way for a broad roll-out of 5G services by mobile network operators from 2020.
China’s bid to gain a greater share of the intellectual property behind the universal 5G standard would not only increase its global influence, but improve its bargaining power with foreign patent holders and help lower costs for mainland telecoms equipment makers, chip companies and other enterprises in the supply chain.
China is on the cusp of recasting itself as a leading technology innovator from a mere follower in the telecommunications industry, as efforts to develop a global 5G mobile standard near the final stage. “While China has the world’s largest mobile market by subscriber and network size, other countries have dominated mobile technology innovation,” said Jefferies equity analyst Edison Lee. “5G is the opportunity of the century for China.”
China is #1 in Artificial Intelligence (AI) funding, startups and publications (link, link)
Xu runs SenseTime Group Ltd., which makes artificial intelligence software that recognizes objects and faces, and counts China’s biggest smartphone brands as customers. In July, SenseTime raised $410 million, a sum it said was the largest single round for an AI company to date. That feat may soon be topped, probably by another startup in China. The nation is betting heavily on AI.
Money is pouring in from China’s investors, big internet companies and its government, driven by a belief that the technology can remake entire sectors of the economy, as well as national security.
A similar effort is underway in the U.S., but in this new global arms race, China has three advantages: A vast pool of engineers to write the software, a massive base of 751 million internet users to test it on, and most importantly staunch government support that includes handing over gobs of citizens’ data –- something that makes Western officials squirm.
“…Historically, the country has been a lightweight in those regards. It’s suffered through a “brain drain,” a flight of academics and specialists out of the country. “China currently has a talent shortage when it comes to top tier AI experts,” said Connie Chan, a partner at venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz.
“While there have been more deep learning papers published in China than the U.S. since 2016, those papers have not been as influential as those from the U.S. and U.K.” But China is gaining ground.
The country is producing more top engineers, who craft AI algorithms for U.S. companies and, increasingly, Chinese ones. Chinese universities and private firms are actively wooing AI researchers from across the globe. Juo, the University of Rochester professor, said top researchers can get offers of $500,000 or more in annual compensation from U.S. tech companies, while Chinese companies will often double that.
Meanwhile, China’s homegrown talent is starting to shine. A popular benchmark in AI research is the ImageNet competition, an annual challenge to devise a visual recognition system with the lowest error rate. Like last year, this year’s top winners were dominated by researchers from China, including a team from the Ministry of Public Security’s Third Research Institute.”
China has shot far ahead of the US on deep-learning patents, 2018 China wants to become a country of innovation, and lead the world in artificial intelligence in 2030 .
China, still derided by many in the West as the “Great Imitator,” is set to become the world’s leading research and development (R&D) spender within about 10 years, according to a report by advisory firm KPMG, which notes that in 2013, China committed $220bn in R&D spending, second globally only to the United States, which is estimated to have spent $424bn. This year, research firm Battelle and R&D Magazine predict in their 2014 Global R&D Funding Forecast that China will spend $284bn, a year-on-year increase of more than 20%, far eclipsing the US’s same-period increase of just one percent.
[I7] Satellites in Orbit / Space
China is #2 in number of satellites in orbit/space (280 satellites as of 2018). In 2018, China became the first country to land on the far side of the moon.
The UCS Satellite Database, compiled by the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit science advocacy group, shows that the United States, as of November 2018, had 830 registered units in orbit. That number almost exceeds the combined total of the rest of the top ten. China follows with 280, and Russia is third with 147.
Conclusion
Just skimming through this article, taking note of the size of China and the sheer number of leadership spots would be enough to make the most skeptical nitwit pause and think.
China is a serious, serious nation that deserves respect.
Those that want to bury their head in the sand and pretend that China is not anything to worry about… that the “Trump Tariffs sent China back 20 years”… and that efforts to “contain” China will work… need to rethink their strategies.
I argue one very simple point. It is a point and theme that I have made time and time again, and I will conclude with it here…
The American government requires an alert and well-informed citizenry to function properly.
Otherwise, the American government (and by extension, the proud American people) will just end up as a footnote in the history books. Heed my words.
Links about China
Here are
some links about my observations on China. I think that you, the reader,
might find them to be of interest. Please kindly enjoy.
China and America Comparisons
As an
American, I cannot help but compare what my life was in the United
States with what it is like living in China. Here we discuss that.
The Chinese Business KTV Experience
This is
the real deal. Forget about all that nonsense that you find in the
British tabloids and an occasional write up in the American liberal
press. This is the reality. Read or not.
Learning About China
Who
doesn’t like to look at pretty girls? Ugly girls? Here we discuss what
China is like by looking at videos of pretty girls doing things in
China.
Contemporaneous Chinese Music
This is a
series of posts that discuss contemporaneous popular music in China. It
is a wide ranging and broad spectrum of travel, and at that, all that I
am able to provide is the flimsiest of overviews. However, this series
of posts should serve as a great starting place for investigation and
enjoyment.
Parks in China
The parks
in China are very unique. They are enormous and tend to be very
mountainous. Here we take a look at this most interesting of subjects.
Really Strange China
Here are
some posts that discuss a number of things about China that might seem
odd, or strange to Westerners. Some of the things are everyday events,
while others are just representative of the differences in culture.
What is China like?
The
purpose of this post is to illustrate that the rest of the world,
outside of America, has moved on with their lives. That while they
might not be as great as America is, they are doing just fine thank
you.
And while
America has been squandering it’s money, decimating it’s resources,
and just being cavalier with it’s military, the rest of the world has
done the opposite. They have husbanded their day to day fortunes, and
you can see this in their day-to-day lives.
Summer in Asia
Let’s take a moment to explore Asia. That includes China, but also includes such places as Vietnam, Thailand, Japan and others…
Some Fun Videos
Here’s a collection of some fun videos taken all over Asia. While
there are many videos taken in China, we also have some taken in
Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Korea and Japan as well. It’s all in fun.
Articles & Links
You’ll not
find any big banners or popups here talking about cookies and privacy
notices. There are no ads on this site (aside from the hosting ads – a
necessary evil). Functionally and fundamentally, I just don’t make money
off of this blog. It is NOT monetized. Finally, I don’t track you
because I just don’t care to.
You can start reading the articles sequentially by going HERE.
You can visit the Index Page HERE to explore by article subject.
You can also ask the author some questions. You can go HERE to find out how to go about this.
