Few people remain influential at 100. They are either dead or about to die, frail in mind and body. Henry Kissinger, the former US Secretary of State, is both alive and influential. He might be frail in body, but his mind is sharp. Having outlived almost all his detractors, the man once accused of a dark side that changed much of the world, has evolved over the past decades into a statesman feted by leaders globally. Nobody alive has more experience of international affairs than him, The Economist magazine recently wrote after interviewing him.
Tag Archives: China
View: De-risking China business
At a closed-door business meeting in Singapore in March attended by representatives of large US firms, much conversation was about China. Is the purported ‘de-coupling’ of the world’s two biggest economies working? Is it the correct direction to take? Will the politics in Washington ahead of next year’s presidential elections, and naming of China as the ‘prime enemy’.
Tea And Capitalism
For much of the 20th century, Western experts viewed China as a pre-capitalist society. They typically equated ‘capitalism’ with industrialisation and innovation, spectacular benchmarks such as coal-powered engines, steel factories and advances in chemical and mechanical engineering. These technological breakthroughs distinguished the ‘West’ from the ‘rest’, and it was their absence in China – and much of Asia – that marked it as ‘pre-capitalist’.
Not Your Tibetan Buddhism
Far from being easy to grasp and anodyne, Tibetan Buddhism is rich in tantric practices, the impenetrably esoteric ideas and techniques used to try to slingshot spiritual seekers directly towards the enlightenment they seek to attain within this lifetime to best help others.
Western Philosophy Is Racist
Mainstream philosophy in the so-called West is narrow-minded, unimaginative, and even xenophobic…how else can we explain the fact that the rich philosophical traditions of China, India, Africa, and the Indigenous peoples of the Americas are completely ignored by almost all philosophy departments in both Europe and the English-speaking world?
Disruptor Or Disrupted: The Story Of Global R&D
Given a choice of being the disruptor or the disrupted, many would prefer to choose the former. But it’s not as easy as just flipping a switch and subsequently reaping the benefits of a forward-looking vision, new product categories, and forthcoming patents. Instead, an organisation has to proactively acquire this innovation and intellectual capital from somewhere.
Why Are China’s Venture Capitalists Going Gaga Over A Tibetan Pilgrimage Film?
A birth, a death, a pilgrimage. A film about the 1,200-mile journey of a pregnant woman, a butcher who wants to atone for his sins and a rag-tag band of villagers who go on foot from their small village in Tibet to the sacred Mt. Kailash has become a surprise winner at the Chinese box office. It has also found a cult following among an unexpected audience — China’s venture capitalists and startup founders.
This One Is Scary
The last paragraph of a fascinating book on what is the world’s biggest problem — population.
“Over the next 15 years some 2 billion new babies will be born, 2 billion children will need to commence school, and 1.2 billion young adults will need to find work. In addition, the fastest-growing age group globally will be over 60s. Acknowledging the importance of age-structural change, and ensuring that it is integrated into national and international policymaking, will be essential as the globe transitions from a predominantly younger to a predominantly older world.”
We all need to think about this one.
(Excerpt from: How Population Change will transform Our World by Sarah Harper)
Will China Find The Next Tutankhamen In Egypt?
It has been nearly a century since the British archaeologist Howard Carter discovered the burial place of King Tut in the famed Valley of the Kings in Egypt.
That was the first, and as yet the last, fully intact tomb of an Egyptian Pharaoh to have been found. While archaeologists have kept digging since, they have not discovered any that hasn’t already been ravaged by gravediggers in the ancient times.
Now, it is the turn of the Chinese to try their luck.
Chinese archaeologists are expected to start digging in Egypt for the first time, as authorities of the two nations are in discussion of a cultural cooperation project, Xinhua reported.
Institute of Archaeology under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences will collaborate with Egyptian experts to carry out archaeological excavations, cultural relics protection, and safety monitoring and control in key sites in Egypt, Wang Wei, director of the institute told.
The institute will also train Egyptian experts in protecting archaeological discoveries.
“This will be the very first time that two of the four ancient civilizations join hands in archaeology — it could be a milestone in the history of bilateral cultural exchanges,” said Wang.
“Working in Egypt, one of the oldest civilizations in the world, is a dream and an honor for most archaeologists,” he said. “We will likely start with the Egyptian temples.”
Egypt has conducted more than 200 excavation and cultural-relics protection projects with foreign institutions, but none of them with China.
Chinese archaeological teams own the world’s leading three-dimensional remote sensing and three-dimensional imaging technology, as well as advanced indoor testing and analysis techniques, said Wang.
China also has rich excavation and research experience with large-scale historical sites, like big cities and palaces, which could help Egypt.
Dragon Flu | For A Global Power, It Is Necessary To Speak
The inability of the world’s second-biggest economy, its representatives and its leaders to communicate and interact with the world is plain bad news for everybody. If you are not able to tell your story, people tend to make up their own tales. Perceptions matter and as Beijing would know, the Chinese aren’t the most loved people in the world.
This Day And That 