G-8: RIP?

cobra#1:

Yes, the meeting did not produce anything of significance. But the very fact that Bush was forced to call it is significant. The reason is simple. If G8 was to be formed today, it wouldn't have the same membership. China would be the second most important country in such a grouping now. Saudi Arabia will be important as long as the world is dependent upon petroleum; China is sitting over two trillion dollars of reserves and can destabilize the global financial system by itself. China and India are increasingly important when it comes to the demand for oil and other commodities as also for the solution to solving the environment-related problems. G8 is passé.

HP: Actually G-8 is out, G-20 is in. Indeed, the only guy with a fat checkbook in the G-20 meetings was...the Chinaman. George Bush came to the meetings with a hole in his shoe (joke) and had to borrow money from the Chinese to pay the cab fare back to his home (second joke, i am trying to ape Hamidm the Comedian).

But seriously, this is a simple recognition of the reality that developing countries are increasing their share of the GDP, and thus the world is fast moving in the direction of the pre-Industrial Age situation whereby India and China were among the largest economies of the world, and Europe was a piddly little peninsula clinging to one edge of the known world.

Re: # 15

romair mian,

..... read SR's post to understand why you are making a fool out of yourself (again) ..... you remind me of all my mentally handicapped cousins in the army who read something on the internet and then go on to extrapolate it into a wild theory ..... i know it is hard to get rid of the airman training that you received at kohat, but please stop making us pakis look bad in front of the horrible hindoos on this forum ...... i cringe everytime you open your big mouth ........ think!

chal oay bulleya o-thay chali-A jithay saa-ray un-nay
na koi saadi zaat pecha-nay, tay na koi saa-nu munay...

Let's be under no illusions that the preponderance of one ethnicity over another is what will determine the aggregate tenor of human society. Human bodies are just the hardware. The software is the culture and values. Skin color and other genetic features are secondary.

Someone pointed out that MUTTS will inherit the earth. I totally agree. SO this issue that you raise about ethnicities is moot. The important issue is what value system or ideologies will prevail. It appears to me that whatever tomorrow's global culture turns out to be, it will be quite different from anything we have today. Science and technology will, somehow, play an integral role in shaping tomorrow's culture.

I would not gloat over the demise of the Jap or the European. Such demographic variations are no more significant than the ossilations in the relative populations of the dark vs light peppered moths of the British Midlands during the Industrial Revolution that your high school biology used to quote as an example of Darwinian Selection. Be they pigmented or not, moths are still moths and they'll still inhabit the lichen covered trees.

Your point about the Japs having 1 in 4 people 65+ while 13% children DOES NOT, lead to the conclusion that the Japs will disappear from the face of the Earth.

In Pakistan, by contrast we have only 11% 50 plus, and only 4% 65 plus. Over 59% are 24 and under, of which 19 and under are 48% (of total)... Productive age (25 to 64) are hardly 37% ...

This demographic profile is by far more hazardous for the future than the Jap's or the Euros'...

From what I have seen in the last year and a half, the future of the vast majority living in what is presently called Pakistan is, to put it very mildly, B-L-E-A-K.

I have seen the rural, peri-urban and urban slums landscape at some length and I am absolutely sick to my stomach at the abomination, the squalor, the crushing burden of disease and malaise, the cruelty, the injustice and the worthlessness of human life. We are sitting on the mouth of many volcanic eruptions. Rampant epidemics of MDR-TB, polio, hepatitis, dengue, HIV and a host of enteric diseases are imminent and ongoing calamities that surround our polluted and water starved environment.

I also meet designer attired bankers, politicians and businessmen in Lahore and Islamabad and at their cocaine snorting cocktail parties and hear their grotesquely decked up porky begumaat asking, in the wee hours of the night, why those poor slum dwelling bastards don't eat cake when atta is in short supply.

This, my dear brother, can not -- should not -- and will not go on indefinitely.

...SR

Since India is IN G20,

G8 RIP is just ridiculous. They met for 2 hours and after Bush's speech there was nothing to discus. Yes, changes are coming but they will be decided by the G8.

Since India is G20, it is more important than G8...I don't know which world Indians live in. Tolkin posted a video on UP everyone should watch that to see the correct state on Indian mind!

The proportion of children in the population fell to an all-time low of 13.5 percent. That number has been falling for 34 straight years and is the lowest among 31 major countries.....

Japan also has a surfeit of the elderly. About 22 percent of the population is 65 or older, the highest proportion in the world. And that number is on the rise. By 2020, the elderly will outnumber children by nearly 3 to 1, the government report predicted. By 2040, they will outnumber them by nearly 4 to 1.

The numbers tell the story. Almost a quarter of Japan's population is 65 and older; only 13.5 percent are children. The inescapable conclusion is that there will soon not be enough Japanese to keep Japan functioning as a nation, society, and culture. (Washington post)

..........

Orthodox Rabbi Norman Lamm, who raised the question in a recent speech in Milwaukee, admits that world population control is a "moral imperative," but maintains that it must be balanced by a concern for survival of all human groups. "Jews are a disappearing species," he says, "and should be treated no worse than the kangaroo and the bald eagle." Time Magazine

.........

Actually, not really romario...India even at it's height of having a quater of global trade was not a wealthy country. India was rich, but Indians were poor. Same goes for China.

actually, I don;t agree that one needs people to survive. It is not that some people have started to disappear, it is that they are becoming diluted. The largest growing segment of population in amreeka and the west is not indian or chinese or arab....it is the MUTTS. The MUTTS shall inherit the earth.


Middle ages is a poor example because the standard of living of the avgt person in europe was not much different from that of one in arabia or india or china. In the modern times there has been tremendous disparity between the west and the east or north and the south.

It still doesn't answer what will humans do. Say in 50 years, robots and mahines produce everything we need, computers make service jobs obsolete, automation makes us redundant. What will you do?

I will give you a hint...look at the growth in the share of the Financial Services industry over the last 50 years then think Vegas.

Re: # 11
history does not run into cycles like hindu mythalogy.

gentlemen you are not looking at this crisis with an appropriate perspective....it simply put is a neccasary
correction on a grand scale....in my crystal ball iam seeing
a well balanced and robust growth worldwide.

chaltahai#: "what will human do to create wealth when automation makes them obsolete? I have some ideas...but eagerly await the intellectuals to offer up their views...."

....technological progress, prosperity, progressive ideas etc. tend to rotate around the world.....europe was in the dark ages, and it entered into enlightment......prior to that arabs produced the biggest scientific names in the world and went into darkness.....china has been a world power quite often, historically......south asia has been the richest region(s) of the world......

these things rotate....

complete states disappear from the map, which were at one time powers.......

however, what does not change is demographics......one needs people to survive.....eventually, it will be the number of people which will decide who ends up where......

technology will, eventually, be ubiquous.....

some groups have started to disappear ......jews, russians and japanese being at the top of the list (not that i have anything against them).....the caucasian man has started to also..

....pretty soon, the only thing left in the western world will be second-hand brown guys like hamidm mian, procreating the white man out of his land......much like what the white man did to others.......in fact, they may even take the caucasian man down, before his time.......

trust me, the world will be brown and yellow in the future.....as will g-8s and g-20.......economic changes occur faster than demographic ones, but demographic changes are permanent......

oye yar amrika passes gas and the bric are shyting bricks. commodity price-collapse will kill brazil and russia, india needs to build railroads for 60% of its population to shyte on and cheen is running out of people to lay-off.

i think germany and other EU countries will attempt to throw out all the "immigrants" in next 4 years as a part of economic and security policies.

Dosti Mittar: Just a thought!

I do not believe that G-8 is "RIP". They still have clout for the simple reason that they have highly functioning laws and organization, stable state machinery, economic base, tradition, scientific and technological strength, a very good democratic philosophy life etc. Russia -a bit an exception -was admitted simply for the reason to prevent it from becoming a trouble maker if left out! Everybody knows its temper tantrum !

The leaders of these nations never seem to have read history books. They were arrogant ,at times invain, ignorant and displayed too much hubris. They never thjoght that techtonic plates in global geopolitical scene have been shifting all the time in all history.

So now have been forced admit that one has to eat humble pie. Yet I believe, BRIC have a long way to go to exercise their role as major global powers. Take India's case. It is too poor to exercise its clout globally and too populous to be ignored by others. Shalom!
Kamath

Romario, Growth and more importantly wealth creation is not just about manpower.if that was the case, you would have india and china growing at 2% a year and be wealthy countries with indonesia, egypt, pakistan holding up the rear.

It is about innovation. Human intervention in production is getting less and less as we innovate. From products to services (that's why IT consultants stay in budget hotels and not the waldorf astoria anymore) innovation I.e. Automation has reduced human intervention....in this paradigm, having a lot of manpower is not actually a benefit but a liability.
So the question for you...is...what will human do to create wealth when automation makes them obsolete? I have some ideas...but eagerly await the intellectuals to offer up their views.

bull...
god (if anything such is there) bless you...hamidm2 is already getting scared......

but yearly cyclones in BD and couple of earthquakes in China and yearly floods in India will ensure that, the casualty figure from natural calamnities are very high...

during nehru's time, there was a proposal of exporting labourers (from india) to russia. due to lack of direct transportation facility and nehru's ego, that have not materialised. otherwise, india would have got another mauritius or fizi type indian colony....

#4 I think romair was taking into account the improvement in Pakistan with one self-loathing babu (yourself) no longer in Pakistan, and with "rising sun" musharraf and his lapdog rashid out of power. Taking these factors into account, I am sure you will agree that Pakistan is on the road to recovery.

PS: could you run up the tree and fetch me a coconut? your illustrious hero arjun refuses to do that.