Friday, January 20, 2023

Taiwan and Japan

 

Evidently, the will of the majority is the will of the majority and not the will of “the people.” The latter is a mosaic that the former completely fails to “represent.”---Schumpeter

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The proposed carbon tariff in the EU will have (at least) two effects. First, they will push some production out of foreign nations and into the EU. Second, they will induce some foreign nations to move to greener energy sources over time, to avoid the tax.
In the short run, the first effect dominates: The tariffs will lead to more coal use and a dirtier energy supply

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A new study looked at the GPT-3 program’s ability to match humans in three key factors: general knowledge, SAT exam scores, and IQ. Results, published on the pre-print server arXiv, show that the AI language model finished in a higher percentile than humans across all three categories.

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Taiwan and Japan


The People's Liberation Army, the Chinese Party's armed wing, has a handbook analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of Japan. Here's an excerpt assuming Taiwan falls:

"As soon as Taiwan is reunified with Mainland China, Japan’s maritime lines of communication will fall completely within the striking ranges of China’s fighters and bombers…Our analysis shows that, by using blockades, if we can reduce Japan’s raw imports by 15-20%, it will be a heavy blow to Japan’s economy. After imports have been reduced by 30%, Japan’s economic activity and war-making potential will be basically destroyed. After imports have been reduced by 50%, even if they use rationing to limit consumption, Japan’s national economy and war-making potential will collapse entirely…blockades can cause sea shipments to decrease and can even create a famine within the Japanese islands."

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