Re: Discussion topic - rewriting (future) history....?

Just to chip in a little on an area that I'm seeing rather a lot of
these days, and say "Hi!" to everyone on the list:

--- On Thu, 10/20/11, Tom B <kaladorn@gmail.com> wrote:
> 3. Fix the demographics a bit - pure math says the NAC
> should beat the heck out of the ESU and take its lunch 
> money (based on modern day population and GDP).

Project GDP forward enough, though, and you do have China overtaking the
US -- particularly if the US gets "stuck" at its current output for a
long time, though that would also have follow-on effects slowing down
China.

It does make the Russia-centric ESU a bit odd; as others postulated
here, perhaps that is explained by Russia linking more tightly with
China to supply energy and other raw materials (nickel, etc.) and
gaining a larger voice because of it (though I think historically
speaking, countries that are "just" raw material suppliers end up on the
down side of any such relationship).

Technology wise, that advantage may follow over to China as well, but
there are a lot more "twitchy" effects with things like that.  For all
the numbers that people love to throw around about how well high school
students do in China (or Asia) vs. the US, and how many college degrees
China is granting in Engineering, the fact is that when you get into the
details that's comparing apples and lychee, which I can get into if
people want but otherwise no worries.  Suffice it to say,
creativity-wise the US is still far, far ahead, though if we standardize
our school testing down the line we might just shoot ourselves in the
foot by enough to lose that lead, too.

Fwee... back to work for me. ^_-

--Aaron