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Comment by jfktkrkfk | Hacker News Reader

In 10 years China will be the foremost global superpower.

I would urge everyone to be very carefully in their criticism of China or support of Taiwan.

Remember that what you say on the Internet can live forever. People are being cancelled for far less.

And China will not cancel in the way the West cancels. Instead of being fired, be prepared for your whole life to be destroyed, and maybe you being even imprisoned if you step in Asia (see Hong Kong security law).

So think before voicing support for lab leak theory, especially if you are science adjacent.

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No, I don't think I will.

Self-censoring just in case one of the most oppressive governments might get powerful enough to get you? That's the first step to making this a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In 20 years, China will start to feel the effects of rapid population aging caused by its one-child policy.

Compare https://www.populationpyramid.net/united-states-of-america/2... or https://www.populationpyramid.net/western-europe/2041/ with https://www.populationpyramid.net/china/2041/

China’s challenge is to grow GDP per capita fast enough to handle that.

In 20 years, it will be such an economic powerhouse (its megacities at least), to attract significant amount of young people from neighboring countries or ie Africa. You have half a billion mostly poor people in South east asia alone.

They will do what western Europe is doing for decades - brain drain the smart poor from previously enslaved regions to sustain at least some young demographics to support badly designed social systems.

Its like printing money to get out of state debt - you let the consequences be solved by next generation(s), if required.

weird that you'd create an account to post something that basically amounts to a threat of retribution, in case someone posts something bad about China.

The Lab Leak Hypothesis itself is not criticism of China, and it’s very important that we get to the bottom of it! If it turns out to be true we need to learn from it before we leak something much deadlier.

You’re advocating for self-censorship of an important topic, based on the assumption that in 10 years a new global superpower will arise and start punishing those that discussed the hypothesis. It makes no sense to me. Unscientific and overly cautious!

The problem with China is that they consider everything that's not unconditionally positive automatically as criticism.

How is this not just a crap take on Roko's Basilisk?

It's still much more realistic than Roko's Basilisk :)

China can't imprison people outside of its own borders.

Why not? It certainly could under the “foremost superpower” scenario... like the US can today (e.g. Assange, McAffe, Meng Wanzhou (Huawei CFO), ...

Even if so, I think it is a bit far fetched to image that China will go after pseudoanonymous commenters from 10 years plus in past on an American internet forum.

There's going to be more criticism of China in the next 10 years than in the past 30 years combined, as their power continues to expand. It's going to be an ocean of criticism.

China will have to go after a couple hundred million people. It's silly, to put it mildly.

You underestimate the power of AI and social credit like tools. Now add human-free justice systems and block lists to the mix.

Ridiculous. Software isn't magic. Hell, it's barely even impressive. Persecuting 100 million people outside your borders requires one thing: power. If China invades every nation and dissolves every other government then they can commit genocide on every other people. Until then, it's just one poster's deranged fantasy.

Good luck with any of that post-Manhattan Project.

It’s the Roko’s basilisk, China superpower edition.

Wrong:

> Since 2017, it says, at least 695 Uyghurs have been detained or deported to China from 15 countries.

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2021/jun/25/b...

I’m not a PRC citizen.

It can, at the very least, harass and threaten people outside their borders, as is already done today in many Western countries against Chinese/Russian/Saudi-Arabian/Belarussian/etc dissidents living abroad. Modern democracies are wholly ill-equipped to deal with modern authoritarian governments and the means they have and are willing to use.

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