Month: October 2014

The reason: He wrote 2001 space odyssey which still is readable in 21th century.

If I were asked “What is the best science fiction you’ve ever read?” My answer is “2001 space odyssey” Maybe, this book is just classics, the story is too easy to figure out though, the book is full of scientific interests the author could think of at that time. I still enjoy reading this elaborate science fiction. And I just admire him. How could just a man think of sophisticated story which is still readable after 50 years past?

• Why human survived

Maybe, I don’t know anything about the history of species though, when I read this, I have gotten fresh idea about the development of human society. On this story, firstly, apes were going to extinct because apes are not that strong to survive in the wild, not that smart enough to find out how to live. Apparently, the early stage of human being has to have some sort of revolutionary event to get smarter or stronger to survive. On this story, that is given from Monolith, which teaches apes how to use tool. Because of the tool they could start fighting against brutal animals. They don’t need to break bone when they eat, so that their thin became small enough to make fine sounds. Because of this, eventually people were going to speak. Because of tools, they didn’t starve anymore. So then, they finally started to have time to think.

• Super computer HAL

This is well known fact the name HAL was taken from IBM (H -> I, A ->B, L ->M, IBM). In the story, HAL is the third generation of computer revolution. The big different from the computers we have, HAL is alone. It is alone and works just one super smart computer. Since we have different revolution which is the invention of World Wide Web, the computer we know is working together. On this story, this super smart computer had conflict ideas that confused him because it was give secret order. It went crazy because it cannot tolerate.

• Is there any extravagant in our space?

On this story, human beings found there was the proof on extravagant on the moon. When they built the space base, they found strong source of magnetic field on the moon. When they found that, it sent a signal to Saturn or Jupiter (there is difference on Movie and Novel.) Because it is buried on the surface on the moon, estimated 3 million years ago, it should be buried by some intelligent life that should not be human because 3 million years ago is just the time human came out. So, human being decided to send people to Jupiter or Saturn to look up. How exciting is this story?

• Science have been not so advanced it was supposed to be on the book

Arthur C. Clark wrote that the human being found everything out about material science 1970’s. That is of course wrong otherwise I don’t have job in this world. Human being has been still innovating materials even more than 100 years contribution of many of brilliant scientists.

• What is life?

He also wrote interesting idea about the life. Think about human brain. Basically our thinking is just exchanging the electric signals. That should be very complex though, we might not need to have body to live. Because we think, so we are living, not because we have body.

Actually, 2001 was not advanced like he wrote on the book. The U.S.A sent men in late 1960’s however, human being has not advanced enough to go further. China is going to send people to the moon in 2020. Maybe, human being is going to challenge to space again soon.   We don’t know yet about the extravagant. This book is very fun to read, gives me a lot of imagination just meditating for imaginary space travel. Human being is catching up with his idea 50 years later.

 

The reason: The foundation of neutron scattering science in Asia

I would like to introduce one historical figure in Physics. As Europe and U.S.A., Japan has originated a number of brilliant physicists as well, such as, Shinichiro Tomonaga, Hideki Yukawa, Yoichiro Nanbu, including 9 of Novel prize winners in Physics. Among these physicists, I would like to bring up an experimental physicist who had contributed to neutron scattering experiment techniques for more than 50 years. He is special to me. He is the first generation of scientist in neutron scattering (nearly = diffraction, for the simplicity) in Japan.

His name is Dr. Gen Shirane. He was born in Kobe, Japan, graduated from the Univ. of Tokyo. After his graduation, he came to the U.S., and worked for Brookhaven national laboratory. Dr. Shirane has been recognized as one of the most energetic and keen experimental physicists in condensed matter physics. Throughout his career, he published more than 700 scientific papers, and the qualities of those papers are quite high. His works opened many new fields in condensed matter and neutron scattering experiments.

We physicists have three quantum beams to study materials, which are neutron, X-ray, and electron. Since those three are diffracted by crystal, the techniques are sometimes similar. Nevertheless, knowledge and techniques have been accumulating independently in those fields. I personally think, the technique in neutron diffraction is most mature, X-ray diffraction is now hottest and expanding, and Electron diffraction is expanding and most promising. Among them, I am a professional for this neutron scattering.

In addition to his scientific carrier, he was a good educator. He trained many physicists, especially Japanese physicist. My former boss who is professor at the University of Virginia described him as “Japanese Mafia.” Japanese young physicists often came to the U.S. and worked for him. They learned a lot of neutron experimental techniques from him. Once these physicists became good experimental physicists, went back to Japan, and started their own laboratories in major universities. I am a third generation of his follower of Dr. Shirane. I have never met him, because he died in 2005, the year I just graduated university. However, I always keep in my mind his enormous passion and enthusiasm for science.

I have read his selected publications which listed more than 30 papers with more than 100 cited. This is remarkable figures. I needed 1 month to finish this. He is a specialist for experimental techniques on so called triple axis spectrometer invented by Dr. Brockhouse. After almost 60 year after invention, this machine is everywhere in the world, and very productive. Shirane worked hard on this machine and produce a lot of paper and techniques.

He also teaches me good instrument scientist should also be good scientist. Since, it takes a lot of time to maintenance for this machine and its users, Instrumental scientists tend to be instrument manager. But I believe I have to be very the scientist who knows this machine best, produce papers, invent new techniques, and then give the users good idea to work on, as Shirane had done.

I am going to work for ANSTO OPAL research reactor which started 2008, so the snowball neutron scattering start packing just 6 years ago in Australia. I am in charge of one of these machines in Australia ANSTO. How much productive it would be depends on our contribution to Australian neutron scattering. And also Japan leaded to establish the AOCNA (Asis-Oceania neutron scattering association), whose first conference was held at Tsukuba Japan 2011. The community of neutron scattering in Asia is growing. I don’t have any intention to stop rolling down this hill with this community.

http://neutrons.phy.bnl.gov/Gen_Shirane_page.shtm

The reason: He teaches the pleasure of finding things out

Richard Feynman is one of the best theoretical physicists in American history. He received the Nobel prize in 1965 For his contributions to the development of quantum electrodynamics with Julian Schwinger and Sin-Itiro Tomonaga. We was born in NYC in 1918 and died in California in 1988. He was scientist and teacher. The way of his living left me a lot and taught me about how to live as a scientist.

• The struggle

He was not interested in publishing pretty papers. He was struggling, more intensely than I had ever seen anyone struggle, to understand the workings of nature by rebuilding physics from the bottom up. Feynman, Richard P. (2005-04-06). The Pleasure of Finding Things Out: The Best Short Works of Richard P. Feynman (Helix Books) . Basic Books. Kindle Edition.

 There is conflict ideas struggle and fun to physics. As Elon Musk said, because people struggle to solve the problem, people never forget how he solved problem. And when we finally solved problem tremendous pleasure come to him. The best scientist struggle hardest because the problem he is trying to solve is the hardest problem people can think of. But he can’t live without trying.

• The pleasure of finding things out

Feynman always said that he did physics not for the glory or for awards and prizes but for the fun of it, for the sheer pleasure of finding out how the world works, what makes it tick. Feynman, Richard P. (2005-04-06). The Pleasure of Finding Things Out: The Best Short Works of Richard P. Feynman (Helix Books). Basic Books. Kindle Edition.

The science and technology is different. Science is more like purpose. Technology is like means to purpose. For example, I am physicist studying magnet. My goal is to find out why the magnet has this magnetic property? I am just curious why. Why is this material different from others? Why do these materials have same properties? So, I have to answer the question why. So then, I build hypothesis. Assuming the hypothesis is right, we do experiments. The questions and hypothesis requires technology to do experiment because the hypothesis needs to be tested. Nevertheless hypothesis turned to wrong, finding things out is great pleasure.

• Integrity

Now, Dr. Keel started out by telling me that he had a degree in physics. I always assume that everybody in physics has integrity—perhaps I’m naive about that —so I must have asked him a question I often think about: “How can a man of integrity get along in Washington?” It’s very easy to read that question another way: “Since you’re getting along in Washington, you can’t be a man of integrity!” Feynman, Richard P. (2011-02-14). “What Do You Care What Other People Think?”: Further Adventures of a Curious Character (Kindle Locations 2500-2503). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

 When I just graduated my Ph.D. program, I just wrote my blog in Japanese. Throughout my struggle in Ph.D. thesis, I had been asking myself. What is needed most to be physicist. I wrote the answer was “honestly”.  It is hard to know the law of nature. Many try should be fail. I could add false data to short cut my way. But I don’t, because without honestly, the science meaning anything. Just I know this isn’t right. So, anyone who keeping honest whatever required in human society like promotion or money, I think they are man of integrity in front of nature.

• Because he gave Japanese compliment.

He came to Japan with his wife Gweneth because Kyoto University invited him to their conference. After the conference they have time Gweneth and Feynman had decided to travel around Japan and then they decided to go nowhere small town in Japan. And then they also went to University of Kanazawa, Noto Peninsula. They happened to see transitional ceremony.

My Japanese is very poor, so I say something in English: “I love Japan,” I say. “I am particularly impressed by your tremendous rate of technological change, while at the same time your traditions still mean so much, as you are showing with this shrine dedication.” I tried to express the mixture I saw in Japan: change, but without losing respect for traditions. Feynman, Richard P. (2011-02-14). “What Do You Care What Other People Think?”: Further Adventures of a Curious Character (Kindle Locations 985-988). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

Just his word saves me a lot. One of the brightest scientists respected what we are trying to do. And I would like also to say “I love America”.

The reason: His response for the 6^th grade little girls question “Do scientists pray?”

Almost all people in the world know his name. So, I don’t need to write him much though, maybe I am writing because I would like to know him better. Albert Einstein is a theoretical physicist. He developed the general theory of relatively. He was awarded Novel prize in 1921 for his service for theoretical physics, especially for the discovery of photo electric effect (not the theory of relatively). I don’t want to argue about his history and physics, but I just want to write what I am thinking about him.

• The thought experiment

Two of most important contributions of physics in 20^th century are “the relative theory and the quantum mechanics” And he was strongly against the quantum mechanics at the early stage of development. He said something like “God would not play dice by allowing things to happen by chance” However, his severe criticism helped quantum physicists to think. The reason why it is difficult to understand and discuss the quantum is because the quantum is too small to be observed directly. So discussions are made something “Assuming that the neutron is a particle and also a wave, what if we let it hit the single crystal, then what, to where, and with what speed would be observed” We called this thought experiment, since I do a lot experiment on reactor and accelerator, the experiment sometimes is limited by time and also is expensive. I will do the thought experiment a lot before I do experiment. The quality of thought experiment could be improved with discussion to understand the phenomena better.

• The musician

There are many physicists who play music instrument. Einstein said “I am playing violin to think”. He is totally much smarter and better player than I am though, still but I guess I understand what he is trying to say. For the science, I guess we are using our right brain to think rationally, but usually we struggle with our problem. Sometimes, we would be tired of it. However, when we are playing music instruments, we are using our left brain. We could forget problems we were facing and then we could see the problem with fresh eyes. Maybe, our unconscious keeps working during playing

• The role of school

“The value of a college education is the learning of many facts but the training of the mind to think” I am still processing this idea. But this is an important quote that I have to keep in mind if I would be professor in somewhere in University.

• The ethic of scientist

Since I use accelerator and reactor to do experiment, when I was in the U.S., I occasionally went to Oakridge national laboratory. Everyone who does experiment in we have to meet officer on site to get detector how much we are exposed to radioactivity. So, we have to wait some time in front of receptionist. There is the copy on the desk everyone can take it. That letter is so called the Einstein’s first letter to Roosevelt. It pushed American to do experimental work on atomic bomb to against the Nazi. Atomic bomb is the worst weapon human could have, just one bomb could kill 100 thousand people not only solders but also children and women. This letter tells me why we need to use the great power with great responsibility.

• Do scientists pray?

On Sunday school in New York, a little girl asked the question “Do scientist pray?” Einstein said honestly “Scientific research is based on the idea that everything that takes place is determined by laws of nature, and this holds for the actions of people. For this reason, a scientist will hardly be inclined to believe that events could be influenced by a prayer, i.e. by a wish addressed to a supernatural Being.” But he added,

That did not mean, however, there was no Almighty, no spirit larger than ourselves. As he went on to explain to the young girl: Everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe— a spirit vastly superior to that of man, and one in the face of which we with our modest powers must feel humble. In this way the pursuit of science leads to a religious feeling of a special sort, which is indeed quite different from the religiosity of someone more naïve. Isaacson, Walter (2007-04-10). Einstein: His Life and Universe (p. 388). Simon & Schuster. Kindle Edition.  

I am very comfortable on this idea. So maybe 20^th century and first half 21^st century should be one of science have a great power in society, but people will see the limit of science. If people would depend on science too much, it might be dangerous. It is very important to keep in our mind. The science has (will have) been developed by human beings and society.

The reason: The innovation with anger

Shuji Nakamura will be awarded the Novel prize 2014 for physics with Isamu AkasakiPreview and Hiroshi Amano for having invented energy efficient and environment friendly lighting source.  He was born in Ikata, Japan. He got a Ph.D from University of Tokushima, Japan. Now, he is a professor at University of California, Santa Barbara, CA, USA. He did great commitment to make blue LED (light-emitting diode). Since the red and green LED had been made already, the blue LED was needed to make the new white light source.

• The speed of innovation

There are great inspirations by knowing his ways to study. One point I would like to make here is his speed of innovation. Why has he succeeded faster than anyone and any company else? For the study, he has to make single crystal by using so called FZ (Floating zone) method. The machine for the FZ method is commercial so that everyone can do that. But, the point is he did everything remodeling, repairing, maintenance, using by himself. He remodeled the machine in the morning and tried to grow the single crystal in the afternoon. Since many people tried to remodel with the makers it took one or two months to finish, however he did everything by himself. That’s why he innovate anyone and any company else. This is good hint for me, I should not give up learning how to fix the machine I am in charge of otherwise I cannot innovate faster than anyone else.

• Innovation with anger

On the interview right after Novel community announced, he said “The anger was my incentive. I can’t do anything without anger”

One of surprising events for him is about his compensation of his invention. He was researcher Nichia Chemical at that time. Nichia paid him just $200 for this invention. Can you believe that? He was furious because the company had earned worth $600 million by using his invention. He went to litigate against Nichia. People said that if you go to a trial for this invention you will not be able to be nominated at Novel Prize. Why don’t you stop meaningless fight? But he did. Firstly a district court approve his claiming $200 million for his invention though, the high court rejected. Since the money matter cannot be argued at the Supreme Court, Nichia and he had finally agreement which Nichia pays around $8 million to Nakamura. He said “This is devastating failure, the juridical system in Japan is just sucks” and also said “This is the defeat of all engineers and scientists who is working at company in Japan” And then, unfortunately, he chose to go to the U.S. to get freedom to study. This event is very important to me.

• Read and Do better than what you read.

One of important person for him is Ogawa who gave him to opportunity to study even though company might lose a lot of money. There is an important quote from him from the book “Brilliant” by Bob Johnstone.

Book learning was no good: country boys like him were more practical. “If you study books, you only believe what is written in them, and you can’t go on to the next step. Just reading books and copying what’s in them is no good. Read the books, then stop and think, and you’ll be able to do something better than what’s in the book.” Asked how he came up with his own inventions, Ogawa replied, “By thinking hard and working hard. Everybody used to do it by the book, without thinking. But that way, you can’t make any improvements.” Bob Johnstone. Brilliant!: Shuji Nakamura And the Revolution in Lighting Technology (Kindle Locations 237-240). Kindle Edition.

This is kind of warning to me, I am scholar who is professional of study. But reading is not job but just the part of job. Only when we create something new or beyond, the study means something to us. For the scientist like me, the goal is creating papers. What we have to do is contributing for the society and the world by producing new knowledge.

• The entrepreneurship

 I believe that Japanese have to focus more on the entrepreneurship. I am not sure that this is because cultural background though, Japanese are not taking risk so much lately. The young college graduations want to big companies, like Toyota, Sony. It seems that they are afraid of something to be failure.  Japanese used to have great entrepreneurships. However we might lose it sometime or somewhere. I did not have the entrepreneurships when I was in college. I just wanted to be a scientist. But, I would like young people to have more entrepreneurship in Japan. I would like to contribute to make the pave way of getting the entrepreneurship back in Japan by encouraging, investing, or however I come up with for young people. The following quote is also the book “Brilliant” by Bob Johnstone.

Japanese should ask themselves why, despite the facts that the bright blue light emitting diode originated in Japan and that two of the “Big Five”* manufacturers of gallium nitride LEDs are Japanese, essentially none of the huge surge of related entrepreneurial activity has taken place in Japan. Almost all the solid-state lighting start-ups that have popped up over the past few years have been American, Asian, or, interestingly enough, Canadian. Though the regulatory environment in Japan is no longer as hostile to entrepreneurs as it once was, the Japanese still have much to learn about how to foster risk taking and wealth creation. (Bob Johnstone. Brilliant!: Shuji Nakamura And the Revolution in Lighting Technology (Kindle Locations 119-123). Kindle Edition.)

The reason: The one of earliest example of BIG DATA

He wrote the book “Grouped -How small groups of friends are the key to influence on the social web (Voices That Matter) -” This book describes the social behavior of human being on social networking service. He is Paul Adams who is working for Google service and Facebook. As far as I know, he has the best knowledge in this field, and this idea is one of earliest example of BIG DATA. Throughout reading this book, I strongly realized that it is difficult for Japanese to think in this way. For everyone, it is good chance to know we have to ask first what kind of the scale would be applied to discuss the subject.

Now, the web is entering its third phase of the development. The first phase was documents linked together. When we found the website, we couldn’t interact with other. On the second phase, we started seeing the opportunity for interacting with each other. Some website had reviews, give the readers opportunity to leave comments. Now, the web is entering the third phase, where websites are being rebuilt around people on social networking services. Social behaviors became key feature on this stage.

The data on the web are becoming structured, so then now easy to be analyzed both human and A.I. Now, people started looking at the overview of human behavior by looking at vast amount of data on the web.

On this book, what I would love you to know is how the framework to see the data is important. This is the example from this book. This book can give you the overview how you are communicating with people.

First things you have to remember are the numbers of people we are interacting with in our life. There are clear boundaries how many people we are communicating. The important numbers are 5, 15, 50, 150, and 500. We interact with 5 people as strongest ties. They are the people who we care most, like parents, partners, children, and so on. Next, the number is 15, this group is known to social psychologist as the sympathy group. The people we care very much closest friend, important colleagues.  The death of these people would leave you distraught. Beyond this, the number is 50. These are the people who you communicate with on at least semi-regular basis. Beyond this is 150 people these are the people whom you can maintain stable social relations. You know each other, and you know which of them know each other. How much the communication technology has advanced, this is psychological boundary of human beings. The next group is about 500. These are our weak ties friend of friend, people we meet occasionally, or people who met recently. These are people you know but don’t feel close to.

The next thing we have to think is how these groups influence us. The strongest ties are 5 people, with whom you are talking for the 80 percent of all time you talk.  Next, I want to focus on smaller than 15 closest, people, we connected with strong tie, such as family, closest friend. They are the people we trust the most. Strong tie is very important for maintain our well-being. So, we need to focus on them to have good relationship to stay happy. I also want to focus on more than 150 people, even though they are weak ties but the data showed that they can be strong information sources because they are sometimes specialists on something.

The biggest problem on BIG DATA is it isn’t always easy to point out that the correlation and causation is different. The Target can know who becomes pregnant by analyzing the buying pattern of customer. They can send advertisement automatically. Do you think this is appropriate? As far as, human analyzing the data might be fine, we might be able to regulate the way they treat the data though, how about A.I.? The Google’s A.I. keeps reading the whole information on the web. Do you think what will happen when A.I. started reading and analyzing the data by itself. It doesn’t care whether or not correlation or causation. For example, A.I. will be able to know who has tendency to commit crime though, it will not know why, until when it will be fully developed. So, we have to check the technology closely, like nuclear power, it can be bad or good. But, anyways, Paus Adams opened the possibility of BIG DATA.

The reason: He teaches what the physics is like and its beyond

He is not only physicist but also thinker. He teaches me Philosophy and Physics. He was Germany theoretical physicist. He is one of key persons of quantum physics. He published the paper about uncertainty principal, on which he built his philosophy and for which he is best known. He was awarded Novel prize in 1932 for the creation of quantum physics.

I love to read his memoir “The part and the whole”.  As far as I know, there is no English version of this book, I know this book was writing in Germany and there is the one translated to Japanese. On this book, he described a lot of discussions with friends, colleges, philosophers, and of course physicists in this book.  The book starts the discussion with friends when they were high school student. That discussion was actually highly intellectual even though they were high school student. They discussed why molecular, such as H2O, CO2, are depicted by pins and balls in the text because he believed that atoms are connected by natural law so then it cannot be given a specific form like pins and balls.

He wanted to be mathematician at first. His father brought him to the famous mathematician when he was high school student because he already was ready to study at college level. He was reading the book “Space, Time, Matter” by Hermann Weyl. The mathematicians said “You can’t be a mathematicians if you read like that kind of books” So the next, he went to the physicist Sommerfeld. The Sommerfeld said by listening to his motivation.  “You expect too much by reading the book. It isn’t always right. You understand easy things when you understand the most difficult thing.  You need to start what you can try now, I will choose right one for when we meet next time” and also said that “You need to choose to either theorist or experimentalist” This is very physicist like. As for me, my Ph.D. adviser said to me “You can’t be theorist how hard you try because the smartest person would be the theorist. You are good at calculation but not the best in the country, you should be experimentalist then you will survive. ”

Under Sommerfeld, Heisenberg met the Wolfgang Ernst Pauli. He is a brilliant physicist. But he usually went to bar evening and he came to University at night, and spent all night there to study, and went home without taking lectures. Heisenberg, on the other hand, he works in the morning and afternoon like regular person. Since the scientists are given “autonomy” to study, actually this happened to scientist. Actually, I am like regular person, I did not like the way of living as night person though, but the interest in science can make friendship even though the styles of living are different.

One thing I strongly memorized discussion is his discussion with Einstein.

Einstein said “You shouldn’t always believe theories of physics only would be made by observables.”

Heisenberg said “sir? But, you did emphasize we shouldn’t discuss absolute time because it is not the observable on the relatively theory?”

Einstein said, “Even though, in principal, the approach to make the theory by only using observables should be wrong. Because the truth is reverse, the people can know what to be observed by the theory”

This discussion is very important as experimental physicist. The experimental physicist of course use model to explain the data, but the model depends on the parameters, what we could do is basically the least squire method trying to find the best parameters can explain the data by using our model. So we are doing trying to explain what we don’t know by using the model which is what we know. The theory, as a point of our views, determines what would be observed. And also more importantly, our views are sometimes limited by the theory. We should exactly know what we can prove and what we cannot prove.

I also like his political point of view. During the World War II, many scientists had left Germany but he stayed. He focused on the rebuilding Germany when the country lost.  And he was assigned the team to make nuclear bomb at the almost end of World War II. Of course, only America could make atomic bomb at that time. This is very serious matter for physicists. Our work can contribute to peace or war. Even if the invention might be used bad purpose, should we still discover anyways?

We now are too busy to think seriously. We can access a lot more information compare with 10 years ago and also IQ we have is increasing, which means we can process a lot more information. However the processing information won’t give us the answer. For example, what is life, why are we living, how scientists can help people to have better life?

These discussions are very important for me to read, it tells me how the physics should be, what the intellectual life is. Wherever our society is going, there are systems from politic to science. We have to keep discussing what is right or long. The system fails not because the system is wrong, but because human do mistake. So, we will need to keep being back to here “Philosophy and Physics” in the future.

The reason: The prediction of future Chinese and mind of strategy.

He was born in Fukuoka, Japan. Dr. Ohmae got a bachelor degree from Waseda University and then a master degree from Tokyo Institute of Technology in nuclear physics, and doctorate in MIT in nuclear engineering. After graduation, he had worked for Hitachi as a design engineer for 2 years, and then he had worked for McKinsey & Company in Japan as CEO.

• As a Strategist

He is also one of good examples how physics can help thinking on business.

This book “the mind of strategist” was written in 1975 in Japanese. The American version of this book was published in 1982. Since I am a scientist too, the way of his thinking are very comfortable for me.  He was called Mr. Strategy. Even the strongest chess player in the world Gary Kasparov referred this book.

Anyway, this book consists from three parts which are the art of Strategy thinking, building successful strategy, and modern strategy reality. Even though he used Japanese companies as examples, you can easily adapt this idea. Why not trying?  This book teaches me how I can break the problem down to solvable. He wrote 100 books in Japanese though, one of good example is following, he wrote book about the emergence of the states in China at 2002 and the matter became very serious now.

• The Emergence of The United States of Chunghwa

He recently mentioned there are two stories about China in near future. One is that Beijing keeps controlling the whole China, stick to their power to control everything in China. I believe China should not go this way otherwise China will break soon. No one is happy to this situation. But, there is the hope. The other is that China develops as 6 mega regions state like the close concept of United States of America. Japanese will push China in this direction, so that we could do business and have win-win relation.

The nations don’t need to be unit in 21th century, from the points of view of regional economic activities, 3 million to 10 million should be the best. (For example of 5 million is Singapore, 6 million is Denmark.) The nations should be also important though, not so important the way in 20^th century.

Here is the basics idea, the China has 6 mega regions consist of followings. (Counting from the North) This book was written in 2002 almost 12 years ago, the number and current situation from his book need to be checked because in China was still very poor at that time. I do need to research again when I have time though, the concept is same, we should put China to have regional state and help them to develop by their selves.

1. Northeast China: the population 170 million (2002)

Northeast is the first industrial area in China. This area has strong connection with Japan. Since Japan occupied during the World War II. Japanese sat up infrastructure in this area. Many of call centers for Japanese, many students have come to study abroad in Japan.

2. Beijing and Tianjin area: the population 90 million (2002)

The capital area, at least 70 top level university and 200 of science and technology research centers for Chinese elites. Now they are moving from the factory of the world to the R&Ds center of the world.

3. Shandong peninsula: the population 90 million (2002)

The climate of this area is very close to Japan. This area is suit to export the crop to Japan.

4. Yangtze River Delta: the population 140 million (2002)

Yangtze River Delta is the center of finance and commerce in China. Also they have high level factories, such as Ericson, Siemens, Hitachi, Sony, and so on. There is much larger number of parts factories than those of Japan. 60000 parts companies were there at 2002.

5. Fujian area: 35 million (becomes 60 million if it include Taiwan)

Very close to Taiwan. I guess this area had changed so much recent 10 years, I am afraid of writing here.

6. Pearl River Delta. Around 90 million

This area has the world largest computer industry. IBM DELL, SANYO, PANASSONIC, Mitsubishi Electronic, Casio, and Honda are there. The factories which make parts are also good and prospering. For example, Japan largest cluster of factory is in Tokyo- Ohta-word which have 3500 companies (which was 8000 companies 40 years ago) the parts companies in Tokyo still have very competitive skill though, in Pearl River Delta had 50000 companies at 2002. I guess a lot of companies became obsolete, but large number of competitive companies should have survived.

This concept is becoming true, Chine is large country and we need to see the area with different of point of views. I agree with Ken Ohmae. These areas have independent power in China to keep prospering. Japanese push China to this direction. See what will happen in near future in Asia.

The reason: He runs through American Capitalism from the beginning to the future.

I don’t think I need to write much here about his biography. He is the most successful investor of 20^th century. He is the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway and he was ranked as 2^nd wealthiest person. He went to Colombia Business School and was educated by Benjamin Graham (the author of “the intelligent investor”). I learned from him about how I should earn money and how I should use it. There is good book from Alice Schroeder “The Snow Ball”. You might read this.

• The life is like snow ball

Life is like a snowball. The important thing is finding wet snow and a really long hill.

What I learned most is this concept of snow ball. I believe, as long as we are using the stable system of capitalism, our effort, education, money, trust, credit, and so on are accumulating. We need to do right things and keep doing them and gave them to our next generation. The snow ball will keep growing. Firstly, it looks grow slow but then we can’t stop keep growing and will grow faster and faster later on. We have to start rolling the hill as earliest as possible otherwise we can’t get grow large. He says,

I packed my little snowball very early, and if I had packed it then ten years later, I would have been way different than where it stand on the hill right now, So I recommend to students that if you start out a little ahead of the game —- it doesn’t have to a lot, but it’s so much better than starting out behind the game. And credit card really gets you behind the game.

• The rule of money.

The rule no.1: don’t lose money, the rule no.2: don’t forget the rule no.1, the rule no.3:don’t go into debt.

That’s it? But it is very thoughtful. We should use our money very wisely, should not waste money, and should not buy what we could not afford. And we can never emphasize too much not to forget this rule to be rich.

• The style of investment

Graham: Devotion to diversification vs Warren: Belief in concentration

I cannot write much here about his investment style though, two of most important investors have different style, Graham believed the diversification and Warren believed the concentration. I believe you should be very careful if you are going to be like Warren, because Burton G. Malkiel “the random walk down wall street” already showed only chosen few can keep wining without diversification the risk on the market.

Warren also said,

Be greedy when others are fearful, and fearful when others are greedy, but don’t think you can outsmart the market.

This is intuitive conclusion from the best investor and also this has been proven by science.

• Are you right?

You can’t do well in investing unless you think independently. And the truth is, you are neither right nor wrong because people agree with you. You’re right because your fact and reasoning are right.

This is the truth I have to face with as a scientist, also as an investor. We become very lazy by borrowing someone’s idea because we don’t have much time and it looks easy. But the truth is, if we don’t devote to get the truth by ourselves, we can’t know what is true or false.

• We should treat our body and mind well

You only get one mind and one body. And it’s got to last a lifetime. Now it’s very easy to let them ride for many years. But if you don’t take care of that mind and that body, they’ll be a wreck forty years, just like the car would be.

But, I heard that he drinks coke 2 litter every day. Could you please explain to me? But, anyways this quote is very thoughtful.

• The future of capitalism

I don’t know how much Warren Buffett earned money and will earn though, but he decided to donate 99 percent of his wealth said “It could not be better”. By seeing this, I could see the future of capitalism. The capitalism is one of systems, it is different from communism. In the 20^th century, (I have not have conclusion yet because Chinese is coming) it looks the capitalism had worked better. But, the capitalism could not the accumulation and inequality of wealth. How can we fix this? Maybe we could have some sort of hints from what he will do by using his wealth.  I believe that being rich is neither good nor bad. The point should be focused on how the one uses the richness.

The reason : He proved that human and machine can work together.

Garry Kasparov is the grand master who is said the strongest chess player in the history. He was ranked No.1 when he was 21 years old and he had been No.1 until he was 41 years old. Also, he was the last hope of human being against the computer chess machine Deep Blue from IBM. But he failed the match that happened 17 years ago. What is happening now? The chess program on our smart phone can beat grand master now.

He wrote “how life imitates chess” in 2007, I read this book every month. For me, the book is like the modern version of “the art of war”.  Here is what I learned from him and the book.

• The distinction between tactics and strategy is very important. Whereas strategy is abstract and based on long term goals, tactics are concrete and based on finding the best move right now.
• Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.

He taught us the difference tactics and strategy is very important.

• Winning creates the illusion that everything is fine.
• You must train yourself, want to do better even when the thing is going right.

These quotes are very important for us. When we succeed or accomplish something. We might be arrogant enough to feel that we did it because we had worked hard or we have the talent. But, at that time, we are going to go weak because we tend to overestimate what we have done. We have to train ourselves hardest and analyze earnestly when we win otherwise we will lose the next time.

• The attacker has always advantage. I used to attack because it was only thing I know. Now I attack because I know it works best.

This is also warning for us. When we get older, and have some saving or have something to protect like family, We might lose enthusiasm to challenge because they already have what we needed. We need to keep attacking to our goal otherwise we cannot accomplish something in our short life. Do it today and take advantage of being an attacker.

• Your life is your preparation.

So, I am writing this blog. I am challenging 31 days of writing but I won’t be able to write more than what I have read, experienced, and prepared. I think every event in life works same. We will have the chance or the adversity in our life, but we only have what we have prepared for or against it. God might help us but we cannot accomplish more than we have prepared.

• We are the best when human and computer work together.

After historical defeat by the chess computer as a best mind of human beings, he said “if I cannot beat them, join them.” I am so impressed by him. If I were him, I would just give up everything, I would feel lose everything. But, he was different. He started the human + computer tournament. On the game, people may use computer. Do you know what happened? For the first tournament, the winner was an amateur chess player with 3 computers. Then, he got these important conclusions.

The team of human + computer > the strongest computer or the strongest human

And one more,

A weak human + computer + superior process > a strong computer + inferior process or a strong human + inferior process

So, we got these conclusions 15 years ago. So don’t worry too much for Terminator or Matrix because the team might be the best when human and computer work together whatever the team does.

The other quotes I like.

• ‘’Why?’’ turns tacticians into strategist.
• The person who knows how will have always a job. The person who also knows why will always be his boss.
• Self-awareness is essential to being able to combine your knowledge, experience and talent to reach your peak performance.
• Better decision making cannot be taught, but it can be self-taught.
• Every move has a consequence.
• Every step, every reaction, every decision you make, must be done with a clear objective.