China has a lot of people and a proportional amount of very talented people. So does India, so does the USA. We should work with China but not be worked by the CCP. The Peoples Republic of China lead by the Chinese Communist Party has taken actions which have given researchers around the world reason to be cautious about sharing information with them. This is a huge problem for all of humanity since open science has led to great global advancement. This should not be used as a reason not to work with scientist of visible Chinese or broadly Asian descent or who are in fact immigrants from China.  At the same time precautions should be taken. China has in the past sent trained intelligence officers under the guise of scientist to work in the west and funnel information back, industrial espionage. (1) (2)  They have also engaged in efforts to “capture” elites, scientist, industrialist, and politicians via their collaborations.  This would all be fair game if it wasn’t for the fact that the CCP speaks openly of war with our allies, war with mostof its neighbors, committing genocide and slavery right now, and defeating the United States militarily.  


Those who follow my writings will know I have disagreements on certain domestic issues with the people behind China Uncensored, but they are right on target about Indo-pacific/ Asia Pacific issues.

At the same time, it is especially important to remember that individual Chinese people, have no control over these actions. The only way to fight them short of war is to engage peacefully but not foolishly. To make sure we are working with China but not being worked by China.

I agree with Sylvester Jim Gates, president of the American Physical Society, that we must make sure to balance the real concerns over working with China and Chinese nationals with the need to not be unfair to Chinese Americans or people of visible broadly Asian descent. (3) To refrain from xenophobia while not being a doe eyed, naïve, easy mark. One who is left wondering why the invention they worked on is being made, at the same time, at 1/10th of the cost in China.

Intelligence and Humanity

It is a fact that intelligence is evenly distributed across humanity. No race is superior, no country is superior, no artificial group we can pretend to draw hard boundaries around is superior. For example, the race IQ difference myth would have us believe that Hispanics who are mostly a mixture of White and American Indian test lower than either of those races. Yet American Indians are an off shoot of the Asian gene pool. So how can there be such a difference? One can invent complicated reasons to try and explain this. Just as one can insist the world is flat. There is a simple answer.

IQ test are rough, single variable measurements of something real called g-factor. General intelligence g is evenly and normally distributed across the population of humanity. If IQ test are any guide, then about 2.2% of people are of significantly elevated general intelligence. This manifest in ways measured well by multiple choice test like math, or in ways that paper test can’t measure like art, or practical daily problem solving. The last one being the reason we have intelligence in the first place. Science needs all of those types of skills.

If one reading this thinks I am just some liberal Black tranny writing this because “he” is an exception to the rule by also being a theoretical astrophysicist… here is Jordan B Peterson making basically the same point.


In short, race is poorly defined. To the extent that it is and there are differences for most people the differences don’t matter. Like if one group is on average 5’10 and the other 5’8” that is a small difference. At the tails of that distribution being 6’7” means it’s more likely one is a member of the first group. On the tails of a distribution, finding the exceptional people it can make a big difference, yet the exceptions in the shorter group are still tall enough. Small differences in g and its rough measure, IQ do not justify treating different groups with different value as human beings. No group is different enough, and those who are exceptional in that regard are at best … better at complex cognitive activities.

Population Matters.

The above matters because in the west there is a persistent myth now that Asians are smarter than the rest of humanity. There is one fact that this myth is built upon, China has a lot of very intelligent people.

China having the largest population will have more people of high g than other countries. Followed closely by India which has as many people as possible. The United States of America is a distant third in the number of people of high g as we are a distant third in terms of population. To imagine the difference, consider the following. The USA could span all North and South America and we would still have less than half the number of people of either India or China.

Given this basic fact to cut off the flow of Chinese talent into the United States in the form of students, and honest collaborators would be a huge setback for humanity. For a long time, science was oppressed by the Communist Party. As they are opening and trying to catch up and surpass us though there have been real instances of the CCP using our freedoms against us.

Given the above facts the United States should pull closer to the rest of the world and especially India. India has a similar number of people to China. India is also a democracy with a high degree of real freedom of the press, academic freedom, and intellectual freedom. They also have a culture which has as many if not more English-speaking people than the US. The part of scientist, science funders, and institutions must be to balance our cooperation with India and China. Being conscious of how what we do with China may help to prop up a regime that is engaged in violating the fundamental human rights of all those who come under its power.

At the same time there should be utmost efforts made in the United States to learn more about the current and historical issues of Asia. It is where most of the humans on Earth live. If you care about social justice and human rights then you have to care about Asian issues. See beyond the shores of the Americas and see what is going on in Asia.

Given the information available, anyone in the United States who cares about social justice, liberty, and freedom of any kind, of any group, of any description should agree we have to be mindful of what the CCP is doing when we engage with China. What we do now can determine if freedom of humanity can be preserved without war.

References

1. Philip H. Bucksbaum, S. James Gates Jr., Robert Rosner, Frances Hellman, James Hollenhorst, Baha Balantekin, and Jonathan Bagger. Current US Policy on China: The Risk to Open Science. American Physical Society. [Online] American Physical Society, 2021. https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/updates/china-risk.cfm.

2. Directors, APS Board of. Board Statement on Open Science and a Recommitment to Research Principles. [Online] 2020. https://aps.org/policy/statements/open-science.cfm.

3. JR, Sylvester Jim Gates. Current US Policy on China: The Risk to Open Science. Email to APS members.

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