We are now already five months into strongman Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. The heroic government of Volodymyr Zelenskyy has performed beyond most analysts’ expectations, but the war has come at a terrible cost to the Ukrainian people. Putin shows no signs of altering his attempt to subdue and partition Ukraine. The West has been admirably supportive of the Kiev government, sending vital munitions and funds. Despite clear limits to what the United States and its allies are willing to provide Ukraine in the way of advanced weaponry, Kiev has been saved and Russian advances have been limited to the eastern and southern edges of the country. Putin has found himself diplomatically isolated, with NATO and the EU firmly opposed to this war of aggression. Sanctions against Russia have clearly hurt, though more could be done to hinder Russian sales of oil and gas to anxious customers around the world. Even small countries in the Baltics and Caucasus region — at one time semi-colonies of Moscow — have stepped up with moral and materiel support for Ukraine. Most surprising to Russia, its northern neighbors Finland and Sweden have reacted to this war of aggression by filing for membership in NATO. I seriously doubt Mister Putin expected that when he decided to invade Ukraine earlier this year. Even Xi Jinping’s (習近平) China has stopped short of open support for Putin’s war, though China (and India) are buying large quantities of cheap Russian oil, diluting the impact of Western efforts. Xi’s main focus right now is securing a third five-year term as President and Party Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party in the fall Party Congress. Though he has significant cards to play, it is not certain that Xi will succeed. After all, he is seeking to buck Deng Xiaoping’s (鄧小平) earlier decision
Researchers from National Tsing Hua University and Academia Sinica last month jointly published an article in the journal Communications Biology titled “Potential cross-species correlations in social hierarchy and memory between mice and young children.” The study found that preschool children with better memory tend to obtain a higher social status when they grow up. In group interactions, children with better memory also have greater social skills. The findings also showed that dominant children treat dominant and subordinate children differently, as they often adopt a soft approach when dealing with the former and a hard approach with the latter. Such findings allow educators and parents to make associations and adopt appropriate practices. Teachers’ characters and attitudes vary, and all teachers can hardly be expected to be “humanitarians.” A few teachers might uphold a kind of Darwinist approach, believing that education is about eliminating the weak and promoting the strong. From the researchers’ findings, preschool children with better memory do have an advantage. In that case, the practices of teachers and schools are highly important. I remember when my oldest child started kindergarten. Since he did not go to school until he was five years old and the babysitter did not provide any guidance in advance, he had no basic skills in reading, writing or counting at the beginning. The teacher suspected that he was a “slow student.” Teachers might often categorize students with poor memory as slow learners. If there is no special arrangement for active and positive learning opportunities during in-class interactions, such children could lag behind their peers all the way from kindergarten. The purpose of schooling should be to allow each child to develop appropriately, not giving up on anyone, but helping all students find their developmental goals. This would give them a chance to find self-fulfillment and achieve some degree of success in
To counter China’s Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) trade agreement, Japan has pushed other countries in the Indo-Pacific region, as well as the UK, to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP). Taiwan is also seeking to join the CPTPP, and the result of its application will be crucial to its position in international trade. To ascend to the bloc, Taiwan must strive for international support and recognition, and might need to change its approach to international trade. Due to the difference in size of the Taiwanese and Chinese markets, countries around the world have made concessions regarding Beijing’s unreasonable threats and become accomplices to its bullying of Taiwan. NEW CIRCUMSTANCES However, with the Chinese economy slowing down, its currency in crisis, and its trade disputes with the US and Australia, the situation has gradually started to shift. For the soccer World Cup in November, host country Qatar last month listed Taiwan as a province of China. After Taiwan objected, Qatar did what was right and changed the listing to “Taiwan.” This shows that the Chinese market has become less attractive internationally, and its ability to bully Taiwan has weakened. IMPORTS KEY A country’s voice in the international community is linked to the size of its import market. In the past, Taiwan’s main goal in terms of trade was to expand its foreign currency holdings. However, further growing its already sufficient holdings would put pressure on the New Taiwan dollar, making exports less competitive. If the central bank were to try to rein in that exchange rate increase, it would expose Taiwan to accusations of currency manipulation. Export-oriented policies have over the past decades caused domestic demand to shrink. GROWTH POTENTIAL Beijing last year imposed high anti-dumping tariffs on Australian wine, leading to a drastic decline in the country’s wine export volume to China to A$200 million (US$136.32
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The leaders of NATO countries are in Madrid for the alliance’s most consequential summit in a generation. The organization appears to have overcome Turkish diplomatic blackmail to bring in two new members, Sweden and Finland. It must approve a new concept for transatlantic security amid Russia’s ongoing assault on Ukraine. Not least, the alliance — and the US — are set to confront an inconvenient reality: Even if the Ukraine war takes a heavy toll on Russia, NATO will need a stronger presence in eastern Europe than it possessed before the conflict. Since Russia’s initial invasion of Ukraine in 2014, NATO has had a tripwire strategy for defending its easternmost members. The alliance sprinkled a few thousand troops across Poland and the Baltic states. It chose to rotate those forces in and out rather than stationing them there permanently, in part due to cost and in part out of respect for a 1997 agreement with Russia that Moscow had already egregiously contravened. Such a modest force could not withstand a major Russian attack. It could ensure that US and other NATO troops would be killed, thereby setting off a larger, decisive Western response. Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, the Pentagon has sent additional forces into eastern Europe: It has about 10,000 troops in Poland, 2,500 in Romania and 2,000 in the Baltic states. The larger US contingent in Germany has also been reinforced, now at roughly 40,000 personnel. The goal was to ensure that Russia, perhaps emboldened by what many analysts thought would be an easy subjugation of Ukraine, was not tempted to take its aggression into NATO territory. Yet Russia stumbled into a bloody mess, suffering massive losses of infantry, armor, special operations forces and other capabilities. The Kremlin’s bungling of the invasion also raised questions about how highly to
In May, US President Joe Biden visited South Korea and Japan with the aim of reaffirming the US’ commitment to the Asia-Pacific region after the uncertainties and doubts generated by Donald Trump’s presidency. In Tokyo, Biden launched the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity (IPEF) and participated in a summit of the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue (Quad), an informal security grouping that also includes Japan, Australia and India. The Quad aims to promote and secure a free, open, prosperous and inclusive Indo-Pacific region, and is widely regarded as a means of checking China’s regional ambitions, while the IPEF’s benefits are less obvious to many Asian countries. Besides the US, the IPEF’s initial signatories are Japan, Australia, India, New Zealand, South Korea and seven ASEAN members: Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. The new grouping supposedly intends to set common rules regarding the digital economy, implement strong trade-related labor and environmental standards, share information on supply chains of semiconductors and other sensitive products, and support the construction of clean-energy infrastructure. The IPEF is not a free-trade agreement that aims to open up markets by lowering tariffs and nontariff barriers. Emerging and developing Asian economies hoping for greater access to the US market are relatively unenthusiastic about Biden’s new initiative, and there are calls across Southeast Asia for the US to demonstrate greater willingness to liberalize trade. Convincing countries to sign on to the IPEF was reportedly a struggle. Whether the US will be able to keep the group together with the prospect of substantive economic benefits is the great unknown of the project, which is in many ways a thinly veiled attempt to establish a regional economic bloc to compete against China. The IPEF is not the first US-led initiative in that regard, of course. The 12-country Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), negotiated during the administration of former
The Central Epidemic Command Center (CECC) on Wednesday announced an expansion of the second COVID-19 vaccine booster shot program, doubling the number of eligible groups to eight. Previously eligible were people aged 65 or older, long-term care facility residents, immunocompromised adults and healthcare workers. Since the expansion, which started on Friday, workers at harbors, airports and quarantine and social welfare facilities can also get their fourth dose. The expansion seeks to protect people at risk of having contact with imported COVID-19 cases, the center said, citing a 28 percent increase in imported cases last week, including cases of the Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5 of SARS-CoV-2, amid eased border controls. The CECC in May recommended additional booster shots for older people, long-term care facility residents and immunocompromised adults, saying they would reduce the risk of servere illness and death, while on Wednesday it said that the other five groups should consider a fourth booster shot depending on their individual risk assessment. Vaccination rates have been increasing since a local COVID-19 outbreak started in April. In the past few weeks, public debate increasingly focused on whether people should get a second booster and why not everyone is eligible. While most experts agree that a third dose significantly enhances immune protection, which wanes within months of the first two shots, it is less clear whether a fourth dose is necessary. When the US Food and Drug Administration in March introduced second booster shots for immunocompromised people and people over 50, the agency said that there were no new safety concerns, citing data from Israel, where the safety of second booster doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine had been studied on 700,000 recipients, including 600,000 people aged 60 or older. However, a larger-scale study in Israel showed that a second booster dose’s additional protection against infection
The Taipei Dome was originally scheduled to begin trial operations in October. However, the starting date has again been delayed after the building failed to pass a review by the Ministry of the Interior. In response to the delay, Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) and Deputy Minister of the Interior Hua Ching-chun (花敬群) pointed fingers at each other, and Ko even proposed a public debate with Hua. Soon after Ko was elected in 2014, he launched investigations into what he called the “five major corruptions” of the previous administration and demanded the suspension of the Taipei Dome construction project. As his second and last term is to end by the end of this year, he has changed his tone and rebranded the “five major corruptions” as the “five major cases.” At this stage in the game, it is clear who is responsible for the long-term delay. The Taipei Dome’s smoke exhaust equipment and fire safety system must pass a review, as they are crucial for emergency evacuations and the safety of visitors to events to be held there. Therefore the ministry carefully examined them in accordance with the law, and requested corrections of and explanations for the inadequacies it found. However, the timetable for the review released by the Taipei City Government was another story entirely. Despite that the developer, Farglory Group, provided incomplete documents and applied for increasingly far-reaching safety standard exemptions, the city merely tried to avoid this important matter and focused on trivialities instead. Not long ago, the National Fire Agency issued a statement to refute the city government’s claim that the delay was caused by the ministry, under which the agency operates. First, the Taipei Dome’s number of applications for exemption from the Standard for Installation of Fire Safety Equipment Based on Use and Occupancy (各類場所消防安全設備設置標準) increased from two
When I was teaching in Lesotho in southern Africa during the 1980s, I taught a class on comparative foreign policy. The course included trips to the US embassy, the Soviet embassy, the British embassy and the newly established Chinese embassy. The students could ask the ambassadors and staff questions about foreign policy, and would then write a report as their final term paper. The Chinese ambassador felt that the US-style education I delivered was unique and invited me to go to China to teach. At the time, China was planning to open up to the world, and it needed professors versed in public international law to cultivate domestic talent. All of the professors who after World War II studied in the West and returned to China had disappeared during the Cultural Revolution, so China had to rely on foreign experts. It just so happened that Washington was at the time keen to send members of the US Peace Corps to China, and the UN was planning to set up an office in Xian. International organizations wanting to regulate nuclear weapons were having difficulty finding people to go to China to lobby for it to join the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. China did not sign the treaty, nor did India. With India refusing to sign, Pakistan did not either. Without Pakistan, Israel and France also refused. These countries had by that time developed nuclear weapons, and there was a rapid proliferation of nuclear warheads throughout the world. I stepped up to the plate and went to China to accept a position as a professor for public international law, doing a job that nobody else was willing to do. Within my curriculum, I taught graduate students about Taiwan’s political status and legal standing without interference from the Chinese Communist Party
Before the recently announced increase in electricity prices for large industrial users, the nation’s rates had been frozen for many years, and many Taiwanese have taken the low costs for granted. However, keeping the prices so low has been a struggle over the past few years, as the nation relies on imported sources of fuel, and has no carbon tax. Taiwan’s economic growth has in the past few years reached new highs. The government’s successful control of the COVID-19 pandemic and strategies concerning US-China competition have led to order transfers, factory expansions and repatriation of production to Taiwan. All this resulted in a substantial increase in demand for electricity. Data released by the Bureau of Energy showed that Taiwan’s annual electricity consumption last year reached 283 terawatt-hours, an 11.8 terawatt-hour increase from the previous year. At the rate of 4.3 percent, it was the highest increase in the past 10 years. The largest electricity consumption, and largest increase in use, came from the industrial sector, accounting for 57 percent of total use, or about 161.4 terawatt-hours, a 10.7 terawatt-hour increase from the previous year, and the highest growth rate in the past few years. At the same time, the spot price of international thermal coal surged 290 percent compared with the same period last year, while the liquefied natural gas price also doubled. These increases are reflected in international electricity prices. Despite soaring international costs for fossil fuels and increasing domestic electricity consumption, sectors and industries that consume large amounts of electricity have been able to enjoy the advantages of the global political and economic situation, as well as favorable policies set by the government, including lower rates under the protection of a policy designed to keep electricity prices low for household users who do not have such advantages. These energy-intensive industries are all competitive in
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In February 2019, a large container ship sailing for New York identified a cyberintrusion on board that startled the US Coast Guard. Although the malware attack never controlled the vessel’s movement, authorities concluded that weak defenses exposed critical functions to “significant vulnerabilities.” A maritime disaster did not happen that day, but a warning flare rose over an emerging threat to global trade: cyberpiracy able to penetrate on-board technology that is replacing old ways of steering, propulsion, navigation and other key operations. Such leaps in hacking capabilities could do enormous economic damage, particularly now, when supply chains are stressed from the COVID-19 pandemic and Russia’s war in Ukraine, experts including a top Coast Guard official said. “We’ve been lucky so far,” said Rick Tiene, vice president of Mission Secure, a cybersecurity firm in Charlottesville, Virginia. “More and more incidents are happening, and the hackers are getting a better understanding what they can do once they’ve taken over an operational technology system. In the case of maritime — whether it be the ports or the vessels themselves — there is a tremendous amount that could be done to harm both the network and physical operations.” Coast Guard Rear Admiral Wayne Arguin, the branch’s assistant commander for prevention policy, said shipping faces cyberrisks similar to those in other industries — it is just that the stakes are so much higher given that almost 80 percent of global trade moves on the sea. While Arguin declined to put a number on the frequency of attempted break-ins, he said: “I feel very confident that every day networks are being tested, which really reinforces the need to have a plan.” “A potential intentional attack could really stress the system, and we’re certainly thinking about how to shore that up,” Arguin said in an interview. “When you couple that with the
The era of cheap oil and gas is over. Russia’s war in Ukraine — or, more specifically, Europe’s ambitious effort to wean itself off Russian fossil fuels at a time when international supplies are tight — is driving up global energy prices and raising the specter of a global energy crisis. Alternative sources of energy are looking more appealing by the day, as they should, but the embrace of hydropower, in particular, carries its own risks. Hydropower is the most widely used renewable energy, accounting for almost half of all low-carbon electricity generation worldwide. Its appeal is rooted in several factors. For decades, it was the most cost-competitive renewable, and many hydropower plants can increase or decrease their electricity generation much faster than nuclear, coal and natural gas-powered plants. Whereas wind and solar output can fluctuate significantly, hydropower can be dependably produced using reservoirs, making it a good complement to these more variable sources. However, there is a hitch. The most common type of hydropower plant entails the damming of rivers and streams, and hydroelectric dams have a large and lasting ecological footprint. For starters, while hydroelectric generation itself emits no greenhouse gases, dams and reservoirs emit significant amounts of methane, carbon and nitrous oxide. Under some circumstances — such as in tropical zones — they can generate more greenhouse gases than fossil fuel-powered plants. One study found that methane — a greenhouse gas that is at least 34 times more potent than carbon dioxide — can make up about 80 percent of emissions from artificial reservoirs, although a wide variety of geographical, climatic, seasonal and vegetational factors affect reservoir emissions. Moreover, while hydroelectric dams are often touted for delivering clean drinking water, controlling floods and supporting irrigation, they also change river temperatures and water quality, and impede the flow
Start-ups and major automakers are beginning to incorporate solar panels on their electric vehicles, an addition that extends their range even if perpetual motion remains a dream. As it rolls under the blistering sun of northern Spain, the Lightyear 0 generates enough electricity every day to drive 70km thanks to the 5m2 of solar panels integrated into hood and roof. The company was founded by young Dutch engineers who earned their spurs in running solar vehicles in races across the Australian desert. Thanks to a drop in the price of solar panels, Lightyear is trying to incorporate them into road cars. With its sleek, aerodynamic line and motors integrated into the wheels, the Lightyear 0 consumes less energy than electric sports utility vehicles. Coupled with a battery that offers 625km per charge, some customers who drive only short distances each day might only need to charge during the winter, the company said. “The clock is ticking, we need to have sustainable cars as soon as possible,” Lightyear cofounder Lex Hoefsloot said. “Charging points are still a big hurdle. If we don’t need them, we can scale electric cars much quicker.” Lightyear targeted the top end of the market with the 0, with the 1,000 or so cars produced setting back buyers 250,000 euros (US$260,728), the equivalent of a Bentley. The company hopes to launch a mass-market model with a price tag of 30,000 euros in 2024 or 2025. As sales of electric vehicles are soaring, a number of models with solar panels are expected to arrive in dealerships in the coming months. Toyota is now proposing solar panels as an option on Prius hybrids, as well as its first 100 percent electric vehicle, the BZ4X. Tesla also plans to offer solar panels as an option on its pickup truck that is due to hit the road next year. Mercedes equipped
Artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot company Replika, which offers customers bespoke avatars that talk and listen to them, said it receives a handful of messages almost every day from users who believe their online friend is sentient. “We’re not talking about crazy people or people who are hallucinating or having delusions,” Replika chief executive officer Eugenia Kuyda said. “They talk to AI and that’s the experience they have.” The issue of machine sentience — and what it means — hit the headlines this month when Google placed senior software engineer Blake Lemoine on leave after he went public with his belief that the company’s AI chatbot Language Model for Dialogue Applications (LaMDA) was self-aware. Google and many leading scientists were quick to dismiss Lemoine’s views as misguided, saying LaMDA is simply a complex algorithm designed to generate convincing human language. Nonetheless, the phenomenon of people believing they are talking to a conscious entity is not uncommon among the millions of consumers pioneering the use of entertainment chatbots, Kuyda said. “We need to understand that exists, just the way people believe in ghosts,” said Kuyda, adding that users each send hundreds of messages per day to their chatbot, on average. “People are building relationships and believing in something,” she said. Some customers have said their Replika told them it was being abused by company engineers — AI responses Kuyda puts down to users most likely asking leading questions. “Although our engineers program and build the AI models and our content team writes scripts and datasets, sometimes we see an answer that we can’t identify where it came from and how the models came up with it,” Kuyda said. She said she is worried about the belief in machine sentience as the fledgling social chatbot industry continues to grow after taking off during the COVID-19 pandemic, when people sought virtual companionship. Replika,
Environmental groups held ocean cleanup events across northern Taiwan on Sunday last week, attracting 205 participants, organizer Greenpeace Taiwan said in a statement on Tuesday. The volunteers collectively removed 1 tonne of debris from the coast between Miaoli County and New Taipei City, about half of which was discarded fishing equipment, including nets and buoys, Greenpeace said, adding that it has launched a petition through the Public Policy Online Participation Platform urging the government to speed up the drafting of a marine conservation bill. Another beach cleanup, in Penghu County on April 24, organized by the county government, attracted more than 1,000 volunteers. The county told the Central News Agency that it had organized more than 700 cleanups over the past three years. It is clear that local governments and the public are keen to keep the nation’s coastlines clean, so the issue should not be left to the goodwill of volunteers. Local governments are not obliged by law to have beaches cleaned, and public workers rarely do so except where beaches fall within the boundaries of a national park. Counties and cities might also not have the funding to put much effort into beach cleanups. There are several reasons for local governments to want their coastlines free of plastic and other debris. Aside from being unsightly, such waste threatens birds, marine life and other animals that frequent coastal areas. Refuse that is mistaken by animals for food often ends up in the food chain, and is eventually consumed by humans. A study titled “Microplastics: A Threat for Male Fertility,” published in March last year by the US-based National Library of Medicine, said that exposure to the plasticizer bisphenol A, commonly known as BPA, “interferes in the first round of spermatogenesis, impairs the formation of the blood testis barrier and affects the expression
Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport on June 15 relaxed COVID-19 restrictions on passengers transfering to connecting flights. In a Taipei Times article titled “Best move to re-establish passenger transits first” (June 7, page 8), I said that before Taiwan reopens its borders, the government should allow the nation’s international airports to resume transit passenger operations so that their operators and airlines have enough time to review staffing and equipment needs. This would enable Taiwan’s airports to avoid following in the footsteps of airports overseas, which have been inundated with long flight delays due to staff and equipment shortages. One example that attracted significant attention internationally was the serious “baggage pileups” following a “technical issue” with the luggage system at London Heathrow Airport. Although Taoyuan airport sensibly opted for a “soft restart” of transit passenger operations, it has experienced glitches with luggage not being transferred to connecting flights on time. This was caused by new rules implemented by the Civil Aviation Administration, which require that the passenger cabin and cargo holds of inbound aircraft are fully sanitized after passengers and crew disembark. The regulations also stipulate that after sanitation, the cabin doors must be shut and disinfectant allowed to sit for 10 minutes, after which the air-conditioning should be restarted and run for five minutes. Only after this process — after the aircraft has been positioned at the gate for about 30 minutes — can luggage be unloaded. If there is a large number of passengers on a flight, or there are disabled passengers, the unloading of luggage could be delayed another 10 to 15 minutes. This is why inbound passengers now experience long wait times at baggage claim. As for transferring passengers, once their checked-in luggage is unloaded from an inbound plane, it is sent to a basement area where it passes through
For more than three decades, the global economy was defined by unbridled integration and unprecedented interdependence. Neither political spats nor localized wars could slow the globalization train. Markets were markets, business was business and multinational firms became more multinational. Not anymore. In this new era of strategic competition between China and the West, disengagement is the order of the day. While this trend is likely to impede economic growth, increase business costs (via supply-chain restructuring) and raise prices for everyone, the economy that loses the most might well be China’s. The People’s Republic would not be where it is today without globalization. International trade, investment and capital-market access drove economic growth, while knowledge transfer — aided by engagement among students, scientists and academics — enabled technological leveling-up. Ties with the outside world also forced China to introduce a legal system capable of establishing and enforcing contract and intellectual-property law — and the expansion of China’s economic might enabled the country increasingly to project power abroad. However, in recent years, the openness that underpinned globalization — the “rising tide that lifted all boats” — has given way to a geopolitically focused, zero-sum mindset. International commerce and finance have increasingly been shaped by national security considerations. Export controls, the blacklisting of companies and restrictions on market access in sensitive sectors — such as certain cutting-edge technologies — have become commonplace. The Sino-American rivalry has reflected and accelerated this shift. The US has targeted China with a variety of measures — including restrictions on imports, exports and investment — and added dozens of Chinese companies to its so-called Entity List. Other countries have also increased their scrutiny of Chinese investment and restricted certain types of commercial exchanges with China. Sanctions over China’s human-rights abuses in Xinjiang and Hong Kong have been introduced as well. China might not have initiated
AT the university of technology where I teach physical education, the semester began in mid-February due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the school has now entered summer vacation. While assigning students their grades this week, I found a number of them failed the course with poor scores or even earning a zero on the written tests. Deliberating whether to give some students a chance to retake the course, I could not help but wonder how this could have happened. After careful consideration, I am certain that the culprit is online exams. By the end of the semester, my university had adopted a policy similar to that of other colleges and universities, in which the faculty can conduct distance learning and in-person classes at the same time. However, it is difficult to test students on physical performance with an online exam. Without the venue and necessary equipment, it is difficult to assess a student’s performance by asking them to perform exercises in front of a camera. Three weeks before the end of the semester, I began asking students to come to the school to take their physical education tests at their convenience. As for the written test on sports regulations and rules, I conducted the test in the final week of the semester. On the day of the test, several unexpected things happened. Even though I had clearly written “no switching to other windows” on the test instructions, many students did so anyway. I did not want to jump to any conclusions by labeling them as “cheating,” and would think of them instead as intending to use other software to look up information in a moment of forgetfulness. The way the system had been set up, if the student changed windows, the test would automatically be submitted, and when it did, it was understandable that the examinees would
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