Rebirth of science and technology academic master - Chapter 708

c702 Thinking and contending

While walking, Qin Yuanqing came to a piece of grass and lay down on the grass, looking at the bright moon in the sky.

No one would have thought that this celestial body, which is only one-quarter of the diameter of the Earth and one-eighty-tenth of the mass of the Earth, is not even a planet but is just a natural satellite of the Earth. It is actually a huge treasure that will support The earth has walked out of the cradle of life and entered the vast universe.

As China increases its exploration of the moon, it naturally learns more about the moon. For example, in terms of mineral deposits on the moon, according to existing detection data, the helium 3 content on the moon has reached 30 million tons. Forty times the detection volume, this means that it can continuously provide fusion fuel, enough to allow China’s aerospace plane to fly throughout the solar system, and the entire human race will not be able to use it up in millions of years. There are also iron reserves, reaching hundreds of billions of tons. Titanium, which is not abundant on the earth, is 200 trillion tons on the moon.

Titanium is a silver-white transition metal characterized by light weight, high strength, metallic luster, and resistance to moisture chlorine corrosion. On Earth, titanium is a rare metal because it is dispersed in nature and difficult to extract. Of course, this does not mean that the storage capacity of titanium is low. On the contrary, the storage capacity of titanium on the earth is still relatively high. It is not uncommon to find titanium ore with reserves of more than 10 million tons in the world.

Until now, titanium has been a strategic material, and its output is extremely low. The world’s titanium output is extremely limited so far, and China’s titanium output exceeds half. It is widely used in the fields of national defense, aerospace and aviation. For example, titanium is not magnetic, and nuclear submarines built with titanium do not have to worry about magnetic mine attacks. Titanium has also replaced steel in large quantities in rockets and missiles. For example, China’s aerospace aircraft has many components made of titanium to reduce its weight.

The titanium submarines built by China in recent years can sail in the deep sea up to 4,500 meters, and the lithium-air battery gives it an almost unlimited range, making China’s latest titanium nuclear submarine jump to the top of the submarine rankings .

China’s current factory on the “moon base” extracts 6,300 tons of hydrogen, 70 tons of nitrogen, 1,600 carbon, and a large amount of iron, titanium and other resources for every meal of helium 3 extracted.

“I don’t know when we can go to the space station or the moon base!” Qin Yuanqing looked at the bright moon in the sky and muttered to himself.

To be honest, he actually envied those astronauts in his heart, because these astronauts could go to space, to the moon, and out of the earth, but he could only stay on the earth and could not sit in space for a short period of time. The space shuttle goes to space, enters the space station, or goes to the moon to see the lunar base built by China itself.

Even though after so many years of practice, the safety and stability of the aerospace plane have been verified, he still cannot go because of his status. According to what a certain character said, it would be fine to be on earth, but space is still too dangerous. If you want to experience it, just enter the metaverse and dimensional space to experience it.

But you need to know these virtual reality things. Maybe for ordinary people, the things in virtual reality can be fake and real, but for Qin Yuanqing, fake is fake, it is not real. How can this kind of experience be of its own? In space, looking back at the blue planet is so real. How can observing the universe in space be so real?

Looking at the starry sky, Qin Yuanqing’s thoughts couldn’t help but wander far away. His eyes looked at the bright stars and the dark space in between. Looking up at the starry sky, his mind was filled with curiosity and thoughts about the starry sky.

On the third day when Qin Yuanqing returned to his hometown, the place seemed very lively because an academic forum on international political economics was held here. International political economics was born in the mid-to-late 20th century and was in line with the trend of globalization and development since the mid-to-late 20th century. The specific requirements of profound changes in international political and economic relations. The collapse of the Bretton Woods system, the movement for European unification and regional integration, and the first oil crisis in 1973 constituted the realistic basis for the birth of international political economy. From the development of classical political economy, modern economics, international politics and international relations theory, international political economics has gained important ideological sources and theoretical support.

Even today, international political economics is still very popular, and with the renaissance of China, new vitality and vitality have been injected into this subject.

Qin Yuanqing took Qin Zheng and Qin Shiman to listen to relevant lectures with great interest. There were some photos of famous scholars in related fields placed in the hall, such as Shen Yi, Boston Round Face, etc. whom Qin Yuanqing was once familiar with.

There was such a forum, which was about hegemonic stability theory, an important branch of international political economics theory. Qin Yuanqing watched several scholars on the stage speak with great interest.

The founders and perfecters of the hegemonic stability theory are Professor Gilpin and Charles Kindleberger. The main contents of this theory include: hegemony brings stability to world politics and economy, hegemons sacrifice themselves, hegemony must decline, and the loss of hegemony leads to world politics. Economic instability.

An open and free world economy requires a hegemon or dominant power; a very important reason why World War II broke out was that the hegemony of the empire on which the sun never sets was weakening at that time. The empire on which the sun never sets was no longer able to guarantee the international settlement system, while the United States was It was unwilling to take over this responsibility from Britain until 1936. Since World War II, especially the rapid development of the global economy in the past two decades, it seems that the theories of these two professors have been confirmed from the side! It is precisely because of a hegemon like the United States that has led the establishment of an international free economic order with the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and the International Monetary Fund as the main body. The international community has generally enjoyed security and peace, a free international economic order and The international monetary system is basically functioning normally, and the world economy has expanded extremely smoothly.

However, this theory also believes that there are three major reasons why a hegemon will inevitably decline. First, hegemony is based on the overwhelming military, economic and technological strength of the hegemon. However, it is not the existing production capacity that determines a country’s economic development. It’s the economy’s ability to transform itself! The overlord does not have an advantage at this point!

Secondly, maintaining hegemony requires huge costs. The United States’ aircraft carrier fleets all over the world are the best example! In order to pay the cost of maintaining hegemony, the economic surplus of the hegemonic country gradually decreases or is even exhausted!

Finally, in order to maintain hegemony, some free riders will appear, and these free riders will weaken the hegemonic country’s strength! For example, in order to maintain the free world economy, the United States subordinated many of its narrow economic interests to those of its allies and endured discrimination against American exports by Europe and Japan. As a result, the American economy suffered great losses, while Europe and Japan rapidly emerged and became challengers to American hegemony.

In 2020, topics related to witnessing the twilight of hegemony have become popular, and the development of the past 16 years seems to have witnessed that everyone has truly witnessed the twilight of hegemony.

And now, is a new hegemon born? Is the current hegemonic stability theory also suitable for this era?

Regarding what has happened in the past, several scholars do not have much disagreement. However, they have great differences as to whether a new hegemon is born now and whether the current hegemonic stability theory is also suitable for this era.

Shen Yi believes that now is not the birth of a new hegemony. Hegemony belongs to before the 21st century. To be precise, it is unique to Western civilization. Now is the continuation of major changes unseen in a century. The power of the East is rising in an all-round way. The power of the East is The dominant force in the world, especially China, is the The fact that no new world war has occurred so far is proof of this.

Other scholars believe that now is the birth of a new hegemony. No matter how well it is whitewashed on the surface, the birth of a hegemony is an indisputable fact. It cannot be judged by whether a world war breaks out or whether it acts hegemonically to dominate the world. It should be judged according to Influence, the most important thing for an economy or a country is that the economy must be productive. A hegemon’s change from strong to weak is from productive to unproductive. This is pointed out in “Economic Hegemony 1550-1990”. There is no doubt that hegemonic stability theory is still applicable to this era, and international political economics is also suitable for this era and the future.

Of course, some scholars do not agree with these two views, but believe that the times are developing, and each era has its own particularities. Therefore, some theories are applicable and some are no longer applicable. These can be learned from the works of relevant scholars. Reflected.

Qin Yuanqing listened with great interest to the confrontation between several scholars. This kind of academic discussion was also a collision of sparks of wisdom.

The world not only includes science, but also social disciplines. Social disciplines are equally important. International affairs, politics, and economics are all important parts of the world, and studying them is of great use. They often discover problems through research and give suggestions for solving them.

For example, whether there is a new hegemony now is a very hot topic. There has been intense discussion on this issue in the past ten years, but until now there is still no conclusion, and the academic community has not been able to reach a relatively unified consensus. Opinion.

During the three-day forum, Qin Yuanqing kept a low profile and acted like an ordinary audience, listening to and thinking about each scholar’s views.

But it was obvious that Qin Zheng and Qin Shiman were not interested in this at all. Except for the first topic, they no longer listened to Qin Yuanqing in the following sessions. According to them, this kind of academic exchange was very boring and might as well be It’s fun to play a game of table tennis or learn about aerospace.