May 15, 2006
NO ONE CAN HAVE SERIOUSLY THOUGHT HE INVENTED IT:
In a Scientist's Fall, China Feels Robbed of Glory (DAVID BARBOZA, 5/15/06, NY Times)
Not very long ago, China saw itself as a nation on the verge of a technological breakthrough.But today, China appears shocked and shamed by a scandal that has already begun to tarnish that vision. It involves a top computer scientist, Chen Jin, who became a national hero in 2003 when he said he had created one of China's first digital signal processing computer chips, sophisticated microchips that can process digitized data for mobile phones, cameras and other electronic devices. His milestone seemed to hold the promise of helping close the enormous gaps with the West in science and technology.
On Friday, however, the government said it was all a fraud.
The distinguished scientist, the government said, had faked research conducted at Jiaotong University and simply stolen his chip designs from a foreign company, then passed them off as his own.
Cultures that stifle creativity aren't hotbeds of innovation.
MORE:
Research fraud rampant in China: A Chinese study found that 60 percent of PhD candidates admitted to plagiarism, bribery (Robert Marquand, 5/16/06, The Christian Science Monitor)
The stunning revelation of fraud and fakery in the heart of China's R&D industry has vindicated a feisty set of scholars who are gaining traction in exposing a culture of fraud and corruption in China's colleges. [...]Posted by Orrin Judd at May 15, 2006 8:54 AMA recent Ministry of Science study of 180 PhD candidates in China found that 60 percent admitted plagiarizing, and the same percentage admitted paying bribes to get their work published.
They steal everything else, why not that?
Posted by: Sandy P at May 15, 2006 11:34 AMThe distinguished scientist . . .simply stole[] his chip designs from a foreign company, then passed them off as his own.
And that somehow prevents him from being a ChiCom hero?
(I know Sandy already made the joke, and it's not that funny anyway, but sometimes a man has to post what a man has to post. I hate the feeling of postus interuptus.)
Posted by: David Cohen at May 15, 2006 12:01 PMThe point missed here is that technological work at this level isn't the feat in a vacuum of a single brilliant mind; nobody is smart enough to design a modern processor. It's all about incremental evolution of known good designs, and even the engineers working on them have only a limited idea of why (if) those were better than other old designs that have fallen by the wayside.
Posted by: Mike Earl at May 15, 2006 1:05 PMMike:
Actually folks like the Japanese and Chinese can probly do that minor stuff--most Japanese patents are issued for tiny tweaks to technology we innovated. But the big stuff will come from us.
Posted by: oj at May 15, 2006 1:11 PMFifteen years ago the CW in academia was that the Soviet system mass produced absolutely brilliant physicists & mathematicians. Now you can read articles where it is taken as given that the Soviet educational system was hopelessly broken due to the stifling political environment. And yet there was no transition period during the intervening period. It's strange to the point of disorienting to observe the mental contortions our intellectual betters are capable of to avoid the reality that Communism Is Bad.
Posted by: b at May 15, 2006 1:20 PMWhen I worked for a computer sales and service firm in Chicago in the mid-'90s all our techs were Russian-Jewish refugees. One day Boris looked out at the work floor where there were 15 PCs torn open with their innards scattered all over and sighed: "I love America." I asked him what brought that on. "In Russia I studied computers all through school, college and beyond, but never actually got to sit at one and use it--we just studied the theory of the machines, not the machines themselves. Now I get to work with them every day...."
Posted by: oj at May 15, 2006 1:30 PMHe didn't steal the chip design, he hired low wage workers to scrub the markings off chips manufactured outside China and then rebrand them with the name of the Chinese Company.
Posted by: jd watson![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://brothersjuddblog.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at May 15, 2006 1:32 PM
The Chinese scientists are inventing and pioneering, fortunately, in the United States. Check out all those reserach scientists, Ph.D's and post Docs in our high tech pioneering universities: such as U of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, MIT, ...
Posted by: ic at May 15, 2006 1:51 PMic
Why did you leave the Mexican research scientists off the list? You gotta problem with Mexicans.
Posted by: h-man at May 15, 2006 2:33 PM