Item number SCP-1050 Object Class Safe Special Containment Procedures SCP-1050-1 is to be maintained in a storage facility with interior dimensions of at least 5 meters by 5 meters by 32 meters. The ceiling of the storage facility, specifically the area directly above SCP-1050-1, must be shielded to block radio waves broadcast at an intensity of C- addendum 2. SCP-1050-1 is currently stored at area 179. Occurrences of SCP-1050-2 are to be located upon identification of the corresponding change in SCP-1050-1. These are to be located and confiscated by Foundation agents. SCP-1050-2 is to be stored in secured classified document storage. Instances of SCP-1050-3 must be tracked by monitoring radio telescope telemetry. When an instance of SCP-1050-3 is detected by non-foundation personnel, all records must be confiscated and or destroyed, and affected persons should be administered amnesiacs. Description SCP-1050 consists of one item, SCP-1050-1, and two related phenomena, SCP-1050-2 and SCP-1050-3. SCP-1050-1 was recovered from a secret German research facility in ██, following the conclusion of the Second World War. SCP-1050-2a was recovered from Soviet NKVD archives in ██, SCP-1050-2b was recovered from British Crown Archives in ██, SCP-1050-1's previous origins are unknown. SCP-1050-1 SCP-1050-1 is a large obelisk made of solid obsidian, with approximate dimensions of 1.48m by 1.48m by 30.5m. These measurements correspond with the archaic length measure of the Roman pace, equal to 1.48m, Dr. Von Schmidt. According to obsidian hydration dating of the obelisk, the obelisk itself was carved approximately 48,000 nine ██ years ago. Microscopic scans indicate that it is perfectly shaped at the molecular level, indicating creation requiring technology in advance that it is available at the present. The obelisk is covered by a variety of writing scripts. All apparently contain the same message. And all apparently carved with the exact same precision as the obelisk itself. The surface of the obelisk appears to be subdivided into 81.48m by 1.48m sections, each with a distinct form of writing. Of the 80 sections ██ of them have been filled in. Images of several of the carvings on SCP-1050 are in Addendum 3. Specific announces of the scripts indicate the following, in chronological order by age, except as noted. As yet unidentified scripts bearing no resemblance to any known language or writing style, past or present. What carving dates ranging from 48,000 ██ years ago to ██ years ago, these are presumed to contain the same message as the other scripts. A script of unknown origin, dating to the creation of the obelisk, whose spelling and grammatical structure resembles early forms of ancient Latin, though the alphabet and numeral system are completely different. Yahoo! symbols. SCP-1050-1 has provided the ability for linguists to read the previously indecipherable Yahoo! symbols from ancient China, but the foundation had not released any information related to the Yahoo! symbols to the scholarly linguistic community due to the classified nature of SCP-1050-1. Acadia and Kenea form. Egyptian hieroglyphs. Linear A. SCP-1050-1 has provided the ability for linguists to read the previously indecipherable Linear A from the ancient Minoan culture, but the foundation had not released any information relating to Linear A to the scholarly linguistic community due to the classified nature of SCP-1050-1. Olmec script. SCP-1050-1 has provided the ability for linguists to read the previously indecipherable Olmec script from pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, but the foundation had not released any information relating to Olmec script to the scholarly linguistic community due to the classified nature of SCP-1050-1. Classical Latin. Early medieval Swedish runes. Modern English. Circa 1891. Modern Russian. Circa 1943. The scripts all appear to contain the same message. The following is the English version of the message, as written on SCP-1050-1. What notes provide conjectural annotations by the research team? With the exception of a change in the ruler and date when the message was proclaimed again, the message appears to be identical in all languages on the obelisk. Beware the destroyers. They come by the millions from the realm of darkness, which extends where no stars shine. Conjectured to be interstellar space, possibly intergalactic space. For a thousand generations, they slumber, lying in wait. Great nations rise and flourish. There is peace and prosperity. Then comes the dark times, then they return. They cull and burn, they are warped, and move beyond the pale, bigger than any man. Unnatural bursts. Every nail, claws scale and spur. Every spike and welt on the hand of those heathen brutes is as barbed steel. It is said there is no honed iron hard enough to pierce them through. No time-proof blade that can cut their brutal blood-cared claws. Proceeding description, they are warped, claws, appears in Beowulf. Armies are raised and cut down like grasses before a sight. It is said the armies of Amora and Sodom, each ten thousand strong, were swept away between a single rising and setting sun. Archaic Tiberian Spelling of Sodom and Gomorrah. Heroes come forth and are slaughtered, lightning and fire rain from the sky, and the whole earth trembles.  Full origin of the blood-miss that appear across most ancient cultures. The people pray for deliverance from the gods. The gods bite the destroyers, but their efforts are in vain. Aeopetos. Ancient Greek Titan, son of Uranus and Gaia, father of Atlas, Prometheus, Epimetheus, and Minotius, ancestor of the human race through Prometheus, Epimetheus, and Atlas. Ancient immortal life. He was imprisoned in Tartarus by the Olympians. Osir, Archaic form of Osiris. Ancient Egyptian god of the afterlife, underworld, and the dead. He was killed by Seth and had his body torn into fourteen pieces, which were then scattered through the land. Ehikotl. Pre-Columbian Aztec Wendate, associated with Quetzalcoatl. Su Chang. Deified ancient Chinese general. More commonly known today as Guan Yu. All perished. The destroyers are to the gods, as the gods are to men, and men are to insects. Cold and vast and unsympathetic. The wise flee them. The lucky escape. Bity's score of great vessels were launched to seek refuge from them. Bity's score of great vessels were launched to seek refuge from them. Only those led by Sachiabot. Initial name of the Hindu figure Manu believed to be the first king to rule this earth, having saved mankind from the universal blood. Unaptishim. Survivor of the Blood Myth in the Epic of Gilgamesh. Noa. Archaic spelling of Noah from the Abrahamic Blood Myth. Dukalian, a son of Prometheus in Greek myth. He and his wife Pyra survived the Greek mythical blood by building a chest. Escaped. The dark ones banquished all before them. They have come before since before time began. Now they slumber. They will return. Beware to destroyers. Thirteen, zero five seven, nine three five, eight nine seven. In a Karen extinction event, five hundred and forty-two million years ago, thirteen, zero five seven, nine eight seven, two one two, thirteen, zero eight two, nine three seven, three six seven, end botomian extinction event, five hundred and seventeen million years ago, thirteen, zero eight two, nine eight nine, eight nine eight, thirteen, zero nine seven, nine five one, two nine nine, Dresbachian extinction event, five hundred and two million years ago, thirteen, zero nine eight, zero zero four, two four zero, thirteen, one five four, nine five zero, zero two nine, Ordovician extinction event, four hundred and forty-five million years ago, thirteen, one five four, nine nine seven, eight four one, thirteen, one seven one, nine four three, four eight six, a revicant event, four hundred and twenty-eight million years ago, thirteen, one seven one, nine nine six, three five seven, thirteen, one seven five, nine four seven, one one seven, molda event, four hundred and twenty-four million years ago, thirteen, one seven five, nine nine seven, six eight four, thirteen, one seven nine, nine four two, two eight seven, Laugh event, four hundred and twenty million years ago, thirteen, one seven nine, nine nine zero, one eight zero, thirteen, one eight three, nine four eight, seven eight one, Encelerian extinction event, four hundred and sixteen million years ago, thirteen, one eight three, nine nine nine, zero four eight, thirteen, two three two, nine five two, four seven four, late Devonian extinction event, three hundred and sixty-seven million years ago, thirteen, two three three, zero zero one, three eight eight, thirteen, two eight one, nine five one, four eight one, carboniferous rainforest collapse, three hundred and eighteen million years ago, thirteen, two eight two, zero zero two, three six four, thirteen, three two nine, nine four one, one zero eight, Olsen's extinction event, two hundred and seventy million years ago, thirteen, three two nine, nine nine zero, one five nine, thirteen, three four eight, nine four five, three five zero, Permian Triassic extinction event, two hundred and fifty-one million years ago, thirteen, three four eight, nine nine four, six five four, thirteen, three nine four, nine four two, two three seven, Triassic Jurassic extinction event, two hundred and five million years ago, thirteen, three nine four, nine nine four, six three five, thirteen, four one six, nine five three, six two eight, no arson turnover, one hundred and eighty-three million years ago, thirteen, four one seven, zero zero five, nine two zero, thirteen, four five four, four four zero, one seven four, Triassic Jurassic extinction event, one hundred and forty-five point five million years ago, thirteen, four five four, four nine two, zero three three, thirteen, four eight two, nine four four, three nine eight, Aptian extinction event, one hundred and seventeen million years ago, thirteen, four eight two, nine nine one, six six three, thirteen, five three four, four three three, three three four, Cretaceous tertiary extinction event, sixty-five point five million years ago, dinosaurs go extinct, thirteen, five three four, four eight four, two one eight, thirteen, five six six, zero six nine, one three six, Eocene oligosene extinction event, thirty-three point nine million years ago, thirteen, five six six, one one nine, six five two, thirteen, five eight five, four four six, nine one four, middle myocene disruption, fourteen point five million years ago, thirteen, five eight five, four nine nine, five five five, thirteen, five nine nine, eight nine six, seven zero three, quaternary extinction event, approximately fifty thousand years ago, thirteen, five nine nine, nine four five, six seven nine, possible date range, data expunged by O5 command, proclaimed again by Her Majesty Victoria by the grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Queen, defender of the faith, impressive India in the year of our Lord, eighteen hundred ninety-one. The end of the message is different for each time it is written, varying by which ruler proclaimed again the message, and by altering the date accordingly. Testing has revealed the dates of the carving of different messages to correspond with the approximate dating provided by the different iteration of the message. So far, foundation researchers have identified the following rulers, Legatis Maximus Romulus, 53,500 BCE, original carving, proto-Latin, with alternate alphabet, King Gilgamesh of Uruk, 2,500 BCE, Akkadian cuniform, Bero Cacor, soon as read the third of the Egyptian Middle Kingdom, 1800 BCE, Egyptian hieroglyphs, King Midas of Manoa, 8, BCE, Linear A, Caesar Publius alias Trionus Hadriani Augusti, Emperor Hadrian of Rome, 122 CE, Classical Latin, King Eric the Victorious of Sweden, 985 CE, Early Medieval Swedish Runes, Queen Victoria of Great Britain, 1891 CE, Modern English, Premier Joseph Stalin of the Union of Soviet Socials Republics, 1943 CE, Modern Russian, most recent carving. The meaning of the series of numbers appearing in the message is not known for certain. However, if assumed to be standard earth-dears from the date of the Big Bang, then the numbers follow a pattern consistent within four significant figures with the major extinction events in the planche history, followed by a date roughly 50,000 years later. Extensive investigation into prehistoric extinction events has thus far failed to definitively confirm a connection between the events, but has similarly failed to disprove such a connection. SCP-1050-1 also admits SCP-1050-3 from its apex, despite apparently having a composition of solid obsidian. SCP-1050-2 SCP-1050-2 consists of documents with text equivalent to carvings on SCP-1050-1, apparently written by the rulers alleged by SCP-1050-1 to have proclaimed the message. The existence of SCP-1050-2 was discovered when the Russian message, apparently proclaimed by Stalin, mysteriously appeared on SCP-1050-1 overnight, while the obelisk within a Nazi research lab during the Second World War in 1943. SS researchers, discovering the mysteriously added new message, reported the development to their superiors, but no evidence for the origin of the new carving was ever determined by the Nazi research team. SCP-1050-2a, a version of the message written in Stalin's handwriting, was discovered after the war by Foundation operatives. It was located in the archives of the Soviet People's Ministry of Internal Affairs, NKVD, though there is no clear indication whether Stalin ever actually wrote the message. SCP-1050-2v, a handwritten version of the message apparently written by Queen Victoria, was recovered from British archives in 1950, where it had apparently been filed without notice. Apart from the fact that both 2a and 2b match handwriting examples of the respective apparent authors and both seem to have appeared without explanation, no anomalous properties have ever been noted in SCP-1050-2. No further instances of SCP-1050-2 have been uncovered to date. SCP-1050-3 SCP-1050-3 consists of a series of radio messages uncovered at different times by radio telescopes on four continents and in orbit. These messages consist of the following.  The numbers have been determined to be base 8, octal, representations of the 40 base 10, decimal integers, and the obelisk message, preceded by another 60 integers following a similar pattern. It is hypothesized that these numbers may refer to additional events, not documented in Earth's paleogeological history. The proto-Latin message translates roughly to, beware of the destroyers. SCP-1050-1 emits SCP-1050-3 from its apex. SCP-1050-3 has also been receded from ██ other directions in space, including ██. These are receded as occasional pulses of one to three repetitions of the SCP-1050-3 message, suggesting similar directional broadcasts to those emanating from SCP-1050-1 being transmitted from rotating planets orbiting other stars. Addendum 1 Speculations by the SCP-1050 Research Team ██-19 SCP-1050 appears to be parts of an interstellar early warning system of unknown origin. Before the invention of more modern forms of rapid communication, some societies would light bonfire at the top watchtowers, which would then be observed by the next watchtower, which would then light its own bonfire and so on. By this method, a warning of an invading army could be passed along tens or hundreds of miles an hour, rather than days. It seems to the research team that SCP-1050 may be something similar, which would explain the signal we've designated SCP-1050-3. Similarly, by having the message written on the obelisk in dozens of languages and apparently proclaimed by major political rulers of the time, it would increase the likelihood of societies being forewarned about these destroyers, whomever or whatever they may be. SCP-1050-2 might be a means of spurring the governments of major political powers to action, though due to the fact that this warning has not been visibly taken seriously or even publicly acknowledged, suggests that this has not occurred historically. While it may be attractive to assume such defensive measures as Hadrian's Wall or military build-ups by the Nazis were due to prepare to meet some shadowy preternatural threat, no other historical evidence supports this conclusion. Addendum 2 Note Uncontainment Procedures Since the Foundation came into possession of SCP-1050-1 in 1940, O5 command has twice amended to special containment procedures, initially requiring the blocking of radio signals, 1940, then requiring that radio signals not be blocked, 1960, then requiring that they be blocked, 1980. These changes have resulted not from alterations in SCP-1050-1, but rather from changes in the perceived threat posed by SCP-1050-1's radio transmissions. The rationale behind blocking SCP-1050-1's broadcast of SCP-1050-3 is that it decreases the likelihood of drawing attention to Earth by removing this planet from the theorized early warning network. The rationale behind not blocking the signal is that, if the theory is about the possibility of future extinction events being caused by the invention of destroyers are correct, then this planet has some degree of obligation to warn other planets in danger. At present, the risks of broadcasting the signal are believed to outweigh the benefits. Addendum 3 Select Images of Carvings from SCP-1050 Zoomed in detail of original carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in a proto-Latin language with a previously undiscovered alphabet, dated to 53,005 B.C.E. Carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified script of unknown origin, dated to 24,000 B.C.E. Zoomed in detail of carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified script of unknown origin, dated to 24,000 B.C.E. Carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified script of unknown origin, dated to 13,000 B.C.E. Zoomed in detail of carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified script of unknown origin, dated to 13,000 B.C.E. Carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified script of unknown origin, dated to 9 B.C.E. Zoomed in detail of carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified script of unknown origin, dated to 9 B.C.E. Carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in an Akkadian Kenea form, dated to 2005 B.C.E. Zoomed in detail of carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in an Akkadian Kenea form, dated to 2005 B.C.E. Carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in linear A, dated to 8 B.C.E. Zoomed in detail of carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in linear A, dated to 8 B.C.E. Carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in classical Latin, dated to 122 C.E. Carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified Mesoamerican script, dated to 3 C.E. Zoomed in detail of carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified Mesoamerican script, dated to 3 C.E. Carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified Mesoamerican script, dated to 10 C.E. Zoomed in detail of carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in unidentified Mesoamerican script, dated to 10 C.E. Carving on SCP-1050-1, text is written in modern English, dated to 1891 C.E.


Hi everybody, I'm Brittany from AJ & Smart. In this video today, we're going to go through some of the essential skills that most designers actually ignore, especially early in their careers. I'm going to go around the office and ask some of our own designers what skills they think are often overlooked, especially in junior designers. It's going to get pretty interesting. Before we get into it though, I'd love to know what you think are some essential skills that designers need to have, especially early on in their career. I think this is a really, really interesting topic. So definitely let us know in the comments. Let's chat about it. Also, if you have any questions about anything that we mentioned in the video, please ask in the comments. We answer every single comment. All right, thanks. What? Hi, I'm Omar and I'm product designer at AJ & Smart. So one skill that I feel junior designers often neglect is knowing how to present your work and communicate it to the client. And that's super important. That's a core skill for a designer to have because it means that you can speak the client's language. You can tell them why design is good for their business. And that means that eventually you'll be able to sit at the strategy table and talk to your clients at a much higher level than just someone who makes things pretty. Now, the way that you can present your design better is you don't talk in jargon, meaning you don't use design terms that your clients aren't familiar with. You just use simple language that they will understand and clearly show them why your design is good for them. If your client doesn't understand the value of your design, you can't blame the client and say, my client doesn't understand design. It's your job to speak in their language and phrase things in a way that they will understand. And one resource that I highly recommend for designers to check out is a book called Design is a Job by Mike Montero. And specifically, well, it's a very small book. So it won't take much of your time. It's great. It has a great size because large books are hard to get through. This is a very well-written book. It's short. It's nice to read. And if you still don't like reading books, just check out Chapter 7. It's called Presenting Your Work. And it has a ton of tips for you on how to do that well. Is it recording? Hey, I'm Jonathan. I'm the CEO of AJ & Smart. And I'm also a product designer. A skill that a lot of designers overlook. But even senior designers, even a lot of mid-level or senior designers that I know also kind of have this blind spot is the understanding of typography. So I think having an understanding of typography and really how it works and the rules behind typography was one of the most useful things that I learned when starting out as a designer. And typography is often, if you look at most products that you're using, many products or even most products, the entire screen is taken up by different typography and different forms of typography. Ignoring typography means you're ignoring something that's taking up often 80% of what's on the screen or 80% of how the structure of a web page or an app is actually presented. And it's really easy to make something just look really messy and incoherent when you don't understand typography. And I think it is actually a fundamental skill that every UI designer really should know, not just pure aesthetics, not just how to add a nice shadow or not just like how to find good color palettes. But for me, I think typography sort of trumps all of those things. So I think the best book I read about typography was something that I think I had to read in college and it was called The Elements. Wait, you can even show them. It's called The Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Brinhurst, a super boring book, but a really, really great overview of the typographic landscape and a really great overview of all the rules of typography. So that's a really boring book, but honestly, if you search web typography, if you search things like that on the internet, you're sure to find tons of articles about it, but The Elements of Typographic Style is a great book if you wanna just get into the topic and deep dive immediately. So that would be my tip for something that designers often overlook, it's typography. My name is Dee, I'm a product designer and a design sprint educator at H&M Smart. Yes, I think a really big skill that a lot really most designers overlook is facilitation and it's not just that you should be a good facilitator if you wanna be a designer, but that the point of it is that being a designer isn't done in isolation. You alone won't come up with the best ideas and the best understanding of the challenge, but bringing people together with the different knowledge and different opinions into a room and your ability to facilitate them to share their knowledge and then come up and share and build on each other's ideas is a great skill that will lead you to actually making successful things and really coming up with great designs for things. Something that people can and should do is just find a simple workshop that you wanna start with. You could start with a design sprint, that's quite a long thing to do first thing. A shorter exercise like the Lightning Decision Jam is great and just do it, just facilitate something and see how that goes and even get one of your colleagues to be thinking about it and giving you bits of feedback afterwards and just do another one and then just do another one and keep going because you won't be perfect at first, but you'll get 10 times better if you just start running and facilitating workshops. Hi, my name's Tim. I'm a product design director at H&M Smart. So one skill that a lot of younger and junior designers are lacking in my opinion is something as basic as having a professional attitude to your job and your career, working with colleagues. The reason why that is is because nobody teaches you that in like whether you're attending a design school or maybe you're self taught or maybe you're learning design from an online course, but when you're working with other people in a team, it's actually really, really important that for example, when somebody asks you to do something and you say, yes, okay, I can do that. You're super motivated. You want to show them that you're, you know, like that you love your job and that you can take a lot of responsibility, but then the responsibility is actually on your shoulders to fulfill what you promise. So this is something that you have to learn with experience, but one way you can kind of like make that process a bit easier and faster and also one way of really impressing the people you work with is by being proactive and always making clear that you know what's expected of you. So one basic thing that I see a lot of junior designers not doing is for example, taking notes. So when I see somebody's not taking a note, I already feel like maybe I should not be talking to that person because I don't know what you will actually remember. I know for sure that in the beginning, I also thought I would be able to remember everything. This is actually not true at all. You'll have to take notes. You will have to know when something's due and when it's due, it has to be done. And in, you know, when you're attending design school, it's usually fine to tell your instructor, you know, sorry, I didn't get to do that, whatever, I was sick.  All of that stuff is fine, but the sooner you can deliver at a really high level of professionalism and dependability, which is also really, really important, the better it will be for your career because more people will give you stuff to do. They will really appreciate that. They can give you a task. You will fulfill that task. And that's also a really great way to rack up more experience. If you're a designer who is maybe extremely talented, super creative, but you are actually always going over the deadline, everything you have to do needs to be double-checked, then it's going to be less likely that you will get these interesting things and they will actually land on the desk of another designer who might be less talented than you, but they might be more dependable and professional. And that's honestly one of the most important things in an agency environment where you just have to get done on time and within budget. So that's my advice for you. So my name is Bruna. I am a visual and product designer here at Agentsmart. So one essential skill, which is overlooked by young designers, especially, is something that is actually very important here at Agentsmart. At Agentsmart, we care a lot about soft skills. And one skill that I think is really important is improvisation. And that's something that most of the facilitators here have, because it's really important when you are with a client and sometimes they ask you a question that you don't even know or it's very hard to answer. So instead of being like, uh, I don't know, it's very important to improvise. Just use the skills, the informations that you already have in your mind and just connect them in a positive way. So maybe you don't know the answer, but the client is going to feel that he is getting his answer, you know what I mean? So we just have to improvise. I would say that that's a good thing. So to learn that, you can actually do some theater classes, improv classes, I did myself improv classes. So that's going to help you improvising, not only in the work, in your work field, but also in your daily life. It's very good for you to even communicate with other people, other designers, if you are a freelancer, you know, kind of to build your network base. So I just think it's really good, just knowing how to improvise and communicating better with people. Thank you so much for watching you guys. I hope you found that video insightful and interesting. If you have any questions at all, please pop them in the comments. Also, if you have any skills that you think we didn't mention, that you think a lot of junior designers or even just general designers are lacking, please put them down there, we want to talk about it. Also, of course, please like this video if you enjoyed it and definitely subscribe if you haven't subscribed already. We have videos coming out every single week about product design, UX, innovation, all kinds of stuff. So it's definitely a channel you'll want to be a part of. Also, we have an Instagram that you should be following if you're not. It is a daily vlog of what's going on in our agency. We have really cool, valuable content coming out all the time there. So definitely follow us there. And you should be listening to our podcast, which is Product Breakfast Club. It comes out every week on Mondays. It features Jonathan Courtney, our CEO, and of course the author and inventor of the design sprint, Jake Knapp. It's an excellent, excellent podcast you should definitely listen in. Otherwise, those are all the things you can do immediately. Other than that, I just want you to have a great day. So you can just go do that. All right, great, bye. Hi, I'm Jonathan and... Okay, before we get... I don't know if this is going to work if we edit it together, to be honest. It'll be very tricky. Okay, bye, bye, bye.  By just, that's definitely for YouTube. Just keep that bit in.


Ricardo thank you and I want to thank Danon and the other supporters and organizers of the symposium I guess you tried to set me up for something we'll see a number of you in here heard me speak on this we gotta find the right talk it's someplace I'll just use yours I think it's there is that it no no there is while Andrew's doing that I'm gonna at the end show him historically that there were some people in the Midwest the United States that consumed more yogurt than you could ever imagine this is a topic that actually here are my disclosures are pretty minimal other than just being an iconic last Robert Haney who's known to many of you in his room and I wrote this paper back in 2005 and because of time you can go read the methodology here and see how I come up with some of the numbers this is a difficult task to try to put a dollar figure or Euro figure on what the benefits to either the US or worldwide might be if we could improve dairy product intake Andrew set us up it's clear that some societies are more successful at this others are not there's biological reasons why that may not be the case there's also economic reasons availability the list goes on but where we have solid data which is what I'm gonna try to share with you of what the potential could be I think we need to stop and pay attention to this it's no secret particularly in this state of Massachusetts that health care costs are out of control we have a situation here a unique one actually in Oregon where I reside that's different but in both cases we're trying to get a cap on how we're spending our money and I think one of the challenges that the nutrition community faces is standing up and trying to inform the public our leaders that we have a strategy if we could just implement it worldwide that could lead to dramatic health care savings I don't know what the real number is but I can tell you the numbers big if we could do it so my story starts here what I'm gonna try to do is give you just a feel for what a quality diet is I don't think there's a lot of debate about this with exception of Walt's view on dairy foods I'd like to just show examples from the literature when you describe a diet this high quality dairy product just sticks out in the description it's a very consistent and that actually Andrew's right you have to dig to try to find specific examples but because of the way new data is being published with longitudinal studies that are fairly large databases imperfect observational studies there's no doubt about it you can actually show yogurt specifically within the dairy category as being tied to a health benefit or outcome and from that I'm going to use the process and we're going to go through this very quickly and we'll discuss this in much greater detail with Andres and myself in the workshop after this session how do you really come up with a number that you could believe and I don't think it's possible to get a firm rock solid number I think it is possible to say we have an opportunity here to dramatically improve health care at a remarkably reduced price so there is a member of the audience who was a partner in crime with me back in 1984 when we published what I think still remains the largest nutrition paper in the journal science which doesn't usually publish those kinds of papers where we looked at the first end Hain study Victor Fulgoni took a clue from that early in his career and kept chasing these numbers through one iteration after another and when we looked at blood pressure in America you could do a multivariate analysis of N. Haynes and pick out the food groups that would best predict your blood pressure status that is a good one in America and here's the table it's an exact reproduction of table three in that article and it is the original description of the dash diet dairy products fruits and vegetables non-sugar beverages keep us think about this list and then the publications that have come out 30 years later fats and oils and essentially products are protein rich and at the bottom is the famous dessert impact that was first brought out in a cardio trial where as a reviewer I said to the editor please have these authors have the political courage to label it ice cream but they didn't they called it frozen dairy-based dessert and if you just went back to that science paper the benefit of being on a dairy rich fruit and vegetable rich diet essentially a high mineral high protein diet you saw a 60% reduction in the incidence or likelihood of being hypertensive in America and about a 60% improvement in weight and by the way this was the original description of dairy's relationship to potentially improve weight control and at the end of our science paper this is what we concluded Debbie who's in the front of this audience may remember reading this it's not a very exciting conclusion but that's the way nutrition is sometimes and it says you know you need to eat a balanced diet and that is appropriate for your level of activity when interviewed on CBS morning news at the time of this publication the anchor said to me you know Dr. McCarran this is not very exciting and and I had a short answer I'm sorry and it is on tape so let's just look at some examples if we had a you know more time I had more time there are those of you in the audience know that there are many examples of this so here is the cancer study which is actually one of the initial you know reasonable prospective assessments of diet quality and health risk particularly cancer and cardiovascular mortality this is an example that if you were in a fourth quartile as opposed to the first quartile of a healthy diet your all cause mortality was 35% less than if you didn't eat as good a diet the worst one being the low quality when you look at what those authors concluded a quality diet was it's what I said it's the obvious fruits and vegetables whole grains low-fat dairy and lean meats and surprisingly they said it's a good idea to eat this from foods as opposed to supplements and what not and they said this represents a practical recommendation it's almost as exciting as our conclusion you know 20 years before in science you can go look at you know what is the largest cohort that's in the medical nutritional literature which is the NIH AARP longitudinal study and this is a little over 10 years the numbers are small on the screen and I apologize for it but what I've done is not try to distill I've just put the tables as a peer in the literature and if you look at it again both in men and women there's about a 25% reduction in all cause mortality the better your diet I don't know if a drug that's out on the market they could do that and if you look within the tables and descriptions in that paper fruits and vegetables low-fat dairy whole grains and lean meats and poultry now I have to be honest the dairy is always labeled low fat but I'm not sure but if you start taking that data apart you can justify that separation I'll be blunt and iconoclastic apparently for Lindsay's sake and say those are political words they're not scientific words so here's another way of looking at what if what if you what if you have a lousy dietary pattern work in the Lancet in 2005 and again many of you may be familiar with this and an interesting way of looking at it and that they took people who had little fast food or had more fast food and how they changed their intake of fast food and what happened to their essentially their insulin regulation or glucose metabolism and if over the period of observation you stayed with little fast food and you didn't change your change in your insulin regulation and glucose metabolism didn't change if you ate a lot of fast food at the beginning and you ate even more at the end you didn't look quite as good at the end and the same thing applied for weight gain over the period of observation in this study and it's a 15-year period and it's a you know interesting way of looking at it if you then look at what they said increased or decreased if you eat fast foods you know it's not gonna be surprising if you ate fast foods you decided to eat more fast foods your fruits and vegetables went down your whole grains went down your fiber went down and your dairy went down you increased your soda you increased your alcohol you had more fat and you ate more refined grains so it's another way of sort trying to position on the grid where dairy fits into a healthy diet and that it has metabolic or health consequences there's a famous statement from the past presidential candidate who's now a radio and TV host who said you know if it comes through the window of a car don't eat it another way of looking at this is the longitudinal study of what predicts weight gain over the long haul and this is work out of a school of public health here and we're gonna come back to this but the foods that predicted the weight gain were potato chips that's bad news for a lot of people potatoes sugar sweetened beverages red meats sweets and desserts and 100% fruges those that were associated with keeping weight normal were actually improving top of the list and you'll see the actual graph was yogurt and this is one of the studies that begins to specifically identify the yogurt component of the dairy diet as being impactful perhaps over and above other dairy foods and then again fruits whole grains nuts vegetables and milk what about cardiovascular disease hypertension stroke heart attacks are routinely identified we talked a little bit about this by the WHO is the big burden of disease and disease costs in this country this is another way of picking apart observational data and people who do or do not have a cardiovascular event in this case stroke and is there a difference in the way they consume in this case beverages that may identify some benefit of dairy products so this is stroke risk if the line doesn't cross the the zero point which is true the lower two categories and almost true here if you substitute tea caffeinated beverages for a sugar sweetened or non sugar sweetened beverage and then with skin milk you see a substantial difference in your risk of stroke we tend to think of sugar sweetened beverages as worse than non sugar sweetened beverages and I don't I think that's a debate that needs to keep going because the data looks like anything is better than a soda whatever is in the soda and water is neutral which makes sense and tea coffee fluid dairy products are good to substitute so stop worrying when you have that third cup of coffee in the morning you're just going to be more alert to live longer apparently so here's another way you're looking at low calorie sodas as opposed to sugar sweetened and here clearly if you had milk had a caffeine drink your risk of stroke goes down compared to drinking a diet soda or diet liquid beverage and if you call through all the longitudinal studies that now are appearing at a fairly rapid rate in the literature because this is data in a lot of cases that was collected initially where the studies were started maybe even back in the 19 late 1980s so it's understandable that we're now just following seeing 10 15 20 year follow-up data it's not much different than what the Ann Haines data told us back in 1984 you need to have dairy foods fruits and vegetables we can argue which is more important I haven't figured that one out whole grains I don't think there's any debate about it how much whole grains your intestine will tell you if it's maybe too much a handful of nuts or more every day intrigued by Rick Mattis's work out of Purdue that Connie knows that you can eat nuts if he's right until your nuts and you burn more calories eating a nuts and digest them then you can and get the nutrients then the calories you consume it almost sounds like nuts or the ultimate low-fat or weight-reducing food and we need protein rich foods there's no question about the evolution of societies have been based upon the ability to acquire these sources of protein and coffee tea water are good for you I've shown you snippets and some of this Andrew covered there are relationships to obesity our science paper there's a graph I didn't show it that we may remember it that showed that if you were in a category of a higher dairy consumer and Haines one there is a dramatic difference in your BMI in the United States and that led to a lot of the work that was subsequently done by other investigators who on the average have forgotten where the original observation was made cardiovascular disease the focus of our group many years ago was to bring out the notion that there was a relationship between electrolyte mineral content of dairy foods and a reduction in blood pressure which certainly is one of the factors that lies the heart of cardiovascular disease diabetes show a couple examples because I'm not done here cancer of course the ongoing discussion about how much calcium and vitamin D you really need I think Bob Haney wrote one of the great lines in his New England Journal article or editorial last summer when he said more ink has been spilled on this issue with the exception of the sodium debate in the history of medical research you know how much calcium how much vitamin D for bone health renal failure it's an interesting story I'm a nephrologist and I think we're going to see over the next decade some transitions and are thinking about the relationship of diet quality to the evolution of some chronic kidney diseases and that the community my community has probably managed some of these patients in a reverse fashion that they should be managed in terms of slowing the progression of the disease and actually probably the biggest opportunity it's out there is how we use improved nutrition during gestation maternal and child health development I think again the points Andrew made about how the infant evolves has a mineral rich milk rich diet initially and then makes that transformation the benefits as originally brought out by David Barker when he was still at Southampton about fetal programming another issue that was has been at various times hotly debated seems to be very reproducible throughout databases around the world that if you're born bigger your mother's healthier you live longer you have less burden of chronic diseases so focus there in our societies of nutrition may have the ultimate long-term benefits in terms of not only health care costs but productivity and contributions to society's advancement the problem is if you look at the NHANES databases and Victor would be much better to speak to us but in general all this effort if you look at the decade of the mid 80s to mid 90s compared to the mid 90s to mid 2000 we're actually losing ground in terms of the quality of the American diet and I attribute this to the ability of various elements it includes incident experts who appear to show up on TV and radio all the time who've turned eating into what I call near-death experience we have created an atmosphere around our eating that scares people and they think they have to do less cut this out cut that out and we're spending all this money on biomedical research and we're losing ground if the leadership and this will be dangerous this is what dr. Allen predicted if these people in Washington work for a private company they would have been fired 20 times over because we're not getting to where we need to get to and a lot of that I think is our burden because we're not communicating what we need to not just to our colleagues but to society at large so dairy foods are a surrogate for diet quality and health outcomes it pops up in many of the databases with a wide range of reduction of disease risk how tight the association is how reproducible we can discuss under certain scenarios but it appears to be a very consistent finding and if you improve dairy intake you appear to have a major reduction of disease burden dairy again as Andrew pointed out right at the beginning and we're going to talk about in a subsequent lecture it's a very dense nutrient package it's relatively inexpensive and particularly with yogurt it's something that you could maintain and have available virtually worldwide independent of things like refrigeration and whatnot and there's a way to follow this if there's a paper hidden in the journal of nutrition that I still think is one of the more important simple observations if you just follow urinary potassium intake which is a marker of dairy you can predict whether or not somebody is on a quality diet so we're going to finish up by just showing that the risk of stroke goes down with dairy you can then dig into stroke and a very unusual study looking at intimal thickening and its relations specifically to yogurt consumption and the references on here it just doesn't show on the slide so you either want to be in a moderate to high intake category of yogurt to have less intimal thickening in individuals in this case I believe it was mostly women who are at risk of stroke and here this is a structural change that you can at least associate with yogurt intake specifically overweight again this is a cardiac study which showed that it literally a dose response between little a little more a moderate amount a little more than moderate and a high intake of dairy and a stepwise reduction in your risk of obesity and then you dig in to the Harvard data which I talked about earlier and this is an example where the literature unequivocally identifies of the foods that you would have in your diet to improve weight management milk is there other dairy foods there but yogurt just sticks out above just about anything else incense of glucose and tolerance again a dose response from the cardio trial just as one example that data we're going to continue to hear more about is that longitude and assessment is reported further so if you have more dairy you have less glucose and tolerance you can go in and look at people who say they're lactose intolerant versus those who say they can eat and do eat lactose containing dairy products and you get numbers they're very similar to what we said in science back in 1984 those people who are able think they're able to have regular dairy foods have a 40% reduction in their risk tied to their description of whether or not they're lactose intolerant or not which Dennis would tell you most of them are not but they think they are and they're avoiding dairy products those people compared to those who are consuming dairy and yogurt have a substantially increased risk of both hypertension and diabetes we talked in the previous about the relationship of cancer here is a paper several years ago showing roughly a 10% reduction in all cancers based upon calcium intake as a surrogate for dairy and then you can go into this AJCN paper in 2008 where they actually looked at bladder cancer and culture milk and yogurt and could in this case again it's an example where you can find data within dairy that pinpoints yogurt's impact and it's not subtle I mean I don't know a drug that's been shown to have that impact on cancer risk colon cancer well accepted and here's the general effect it's interesting folks in Bob Haney's category would like the fact that it seems to peg at least 1400 milligrams of calcium a day unless you're at Harvard School of Public Health and if you look specifically that this International Journal of Cancer did at where yogurt impacts that it's you know a fairly remarkable 35% reduction and here's some of the birth weight data this is increasing birth weight which is associated with long-term healthier more productive intellectually engaging and it's actually protein intake from dairy products it's associated with this in its very large database that's in from AJCN in 2007 and then specifically that was dairy protein there's this paper from the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition last year that identified that probiotics yogurt were associated with a improved or reduced risk of gestational diabetes which is a hallmark of a bad outcome of pregnancy so probiotics yogurts were improving or reducing the risk of gestational diabetes so we know there's a variety of benefits this is a partial list the data is pretty consistent in medical literature there's a lot of things at least intestinally that yogurt and probiotic dairy products provide they cover some pretty common problems in society and they're fairly expensive ones and consistent use of probiotic dairy foods yogurt would appear to impact so if you went into the medical literature in the or the government literature a year ago roughly 18 months ago and looked at the health care costs and this is a very dicey proposition our country no country really knows what it's spending on certain diseases and that's the problem of building an economic model because you can't be certain what the base cost of a disease is but as best as you can determine from sources by searching the internet these are the costs based really on 2009 2010 data what given the total cost and what you know the data says you can do with blood pressure ischemia stroke and you can read our original paper we use the same conservative assumptions so these are numbers that are roughly 25% of what you could claim was the benefit and these are the savings that if the United States just got 25% of the population to increase their dairy intake that over the even the first year because some of these benefits are seen immediately particularly with issues like blood pressure and diabetes and the end of the list cancers osteoporosis they're big numbers this adds up to a big number and it's almost so big you look at it and you say this is in the fairytale category but I don't think it is this country and it was highlighted in a Kaiser study from the Kaiser Family Foundation report yesterday we're well into the trillions of health care costs in this country this is not a ridiculous figure for a year when you consider that and if you reasonably projected given the fact that some of these effects take years to kick in you could make a reasonable estimate that in the United States in five years we would save the amount of money that the Congress is trying to find in our budget I just think we need to put our congressman on a yogurt diet so it's essential yogurts why the nutritional profile the unique probiotic characteristics that go back thousands of years and it then provides a way for the lactose intolerant to consume it's available it's portable wide range of flavors it fits in with the fruit and whole grain type issues that you can deal with here Andrew is the example of overconsumption I show this with some trepidation but it's an exact quote from JAMA from two years ago about Dr. Kellogg who founded a cereal company in Battle Creek and I'll let you read what Dr. Kellogg used to do to his patients in Battle Creek it sort of raises the question of maybe it doesn't matter how you ingest it it's all Greek to me so but the study of medicine is still the study of individual patients this woman who was visited by mr. Obama should have been the poster child for nutrition and health in America although her diet doesn't fit with what the chef of the White House is promoting in the United States but she lived pretty long and she did really well eating fried chicken crispy bacon and yes ice cream thank you questions for Dr. McCarron microphone is here can you introduce yourself and hi I'm Barbara rolls from Penn State there are a lot of excellent randomized clinical trials such as dash and they look at dairy do you think there's a possibility to go back and separate out yogurt different types of dairy products and tease out benefits I I would have to believe that Bill Volmer that the Kaiser Center for Health Research in my hometown has that data and whether the component of yogurt had some type of a bigger impact the problem there is it's a very small sample it's a very short duration but it's a clue and it could be helpful I think maybe we ought to try to explore what RCT data are out there that could have this kind of secondary analysis applied Andrew so my question is kind of related you've made some some very strong claims David and he's shut me up but I also set you up by saying that these analyses are very complicated and I don't believe I heard you use the word confounding in your talk so I think in fairness I need to press you especially with a lot of young people in the audience I need to press you to address which I'm sure you have done at great length but address for us the issue of how you deal with potential residual confounding in such associations so I you know that's it's the problem that nutritional research can almost never solve because foods are what we eat not nutrients those foods are made up of a variety of different nutrients and the different foods likewise and you get into a statistical canubrium that is almost impossible to tease apart that said and I don't mean to set Andres up but that's what we're gonna talk about in a workshop is okay you have these observations I guess I'm reminded as somebody who was a faculty colleague at Oregon back around a time the science our first science paper came out and we were constantly hounded with what is it that makes the blood pressure go down and a lot of work had was done has done been done it's still being done to try to figure that out but this individual who was not a nutritionist but eventually became the president of the American Society of Nephrology so it was not totally without its ruble Cortex said what's it matter if these foods help you then let's make sure we emphasize those foods but your point is the problem that we're always going to have and we have to be careful what I know I feel is we're not improving the quality of the diet worldwide it's going the wrong direction and if we could be better at that we would be extending life on fewer meds fewer hospitalizations and costs would go down it probably boils down to the components that appear to keep coming out of these surveys and statistically to come up with a number it's impossible next question please yeah I Dan Marence from Georgetown University and just to get to that it's a problem we have but we can address that we can do randomized control trials I mean I feel like I could have replaced every slide you had with poverty or socioeconomic status and I would have almost had the same exact outcome but really my question is randomized controlled trials to much of my surprise the the best randomized controlled trials we have although there's short term so the Atkins diet is the best for lipids for blood pressure for weight loss and where does that on the low fat low the dairy product you're also re randomized controlled trials you can put not people like me but other people who have been engaged in these types of debates who will argue with you that maybe in the area of nutrition randomized controlled trials aren't the best partly because of the duration and whatnot but there is no question that to the limited extent that some of these diet patterns have been tested in a randomized controlled trial you are better off with what has generally been considered the Atkins type protocol that doesn't mean it's the optimal diet it just means compared to some other potentially bad diet it looks better so okay people are standing in the back there's still seats over here if you want to come up Moggabark or Sheffield I was very interested in your comment that urinary potassium was a good biomarker of dairy intake and perhaps to corroborate some of the data were coming from these observational studies that hide dairy as beneficial we should be supporting those data with measures of urinary potassium yeah we evolved to excrete two nutrients every day almost in totality and their sodium and potassium and they are to the nutrients that on the bad and a good we've debated ad nauseam hopefully some clarity as soon arrive on the sodium issue the study I talked about was done by sandy Logan and Andrew Melton at Toronto and the Mount Sinai research group there and they had good data on what people were eating and they showed very nice correlations between improving diet quality and simple marker as urinary potassium that's something a nutritionist or a physician could use and it's inexpensive and to say you're making progress you're not making progress thank you before we close I have a question as chairman how about your comparisons between high and low fat and the emerging data that high fat is potentially even better than low fat your I think you asked me that question because you thought I'd be dumb enough to answer it but listen dietary fat is a political issue as much as it is a scientific issue and that's unfortunate we've had particularly regulatory agencies and advocacy groups come down very strongly on the side of certain aspects of the human diet those positions are thought to be non conflicted but I would argue that the position of a governmental agency or an advocacy group such as American Heart or whatnot is every bit as conflicted as a corporate position is because they put a stake in a ground and they've said it's got to be low fat it's got to be low sodium and when the data begins to shift on you what do you do you go eat yogurt I'd like to make a point though relative to WHO has already a second note and in fact steric acid is a saturated fat but is considered neutral from a certain cardiovascular risk so again thank everybody and I know we've got to move on okay very good so thank you


Thanks very much Mike. It's a pleasure to be here. I think General Miller got it right that it's very difficult to be a keynote The final keynote after lunch. It's a lot more difficult to be the real final keynote after the audience thinks They've already heard a great keynote final keynote address, but I will do my best It is a great pleasure to be here and have the opportunity to talk about China as a rising power It is certainly an issue that has been a central concern for the Obama administration over the past eight years Undoubtedly will be at or near the top of the agenda for the next administration Before I talk about China's a rising power though Let me say that I think it's important to note that yes China is rising But it already has risen quite a bit and when you talk with Chinese officials and scholars these days about their country They don't often refer to China as a regional or emerging power anymore They talk about China as a major power and at times as a global power And indeed China's economic footprint is global. It is the second largest economy in the world It was responsible for 16% of global GDP last year and 35% of global GDP growth over the past five years It is a nuclear power has the largest standing army and its ability to project conventional force in its own backyard And beyond is significant and growing and even beyond these traditional metrics of Economic strength and military strength. I think what matters with China is that it has a stated and demonstrated desire to shape norms and institutions globally In and of itself. I think that's not a bad thing China's global ambition offers the United States opportunities for partnership for cooperation and for burden sharing But what matters is the character of the Chinese state its intentions and how it goes about realizing or trying to realize its objectives So in about the next 20 minutes or so, and I will try to keep us on track a time wise so that you get your break I'm going to talk a little bit about how I see China beginning to shape the world around it Offer a few ideas about what I think it means for the United States and for US policy And also to take the theme of the conference about complexity and certainty Seriously, I just offer a couple of thoughts about Uncertainty in China and how that might change the trajectory that I'm going to set out So I see China's rise in three contexts first in its own backyard second in terms of its global footprint and third in terms of its leadership in global governance It's rise in the Asia Pacific. I think is the most clear and immediate manifestation of its ambition I like to think of China's strategy as it has emerged over the past several years as all roads lead to Beijing I think it is constructing a trade investment and security architecture that's going to if fully realized Reshape the Asia Pacific landscape. It is doing this through institutions Some of which are old and some of which are new such as the Shanghai cooperation organization the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank regional comprehensive economic partnership and Proposed things such as the free trade area of the Asia Pacific China is either the architect or certainly a lead player in all of these institutions The granddaddy institution is one belt one road or as it now is called belt and road initiative And this is a Chinese initiative that involves 65 countries across four continents to connect China To the Middle East and Africa and Europe both over land and by sea Initially in its initial incarnation Belt and Road was really just an infrastructure plan And we in the analyst community tend to think tended to think of it as an opportunity for China to simply rid itself of its excess industrial capacity But as it has emerged as it has grown in the Chinese conception It has potential to be something quite a bit more including Sort of a free trade and investment regime across all of these countries an opportunity for China to spread its soft power As one Chinese scholar Wang Yiwei has said it is an opportunity for China to shift the geopolitical Center of the world away from the United States and back to Eurasia Generally speaking China receives a lot of kudos for its economic and institutional initiatives in the region But as everyone in this room is certainly aware it has also generated significant concern over its behavior in the security arena As I think it's moving from staking its claims virtual sovereignty in the nine-dash line To trying to realize them and everyone here of course is familiar with the many different Chinese moves in this regard I think you know pushing on the East China Sea anyway to establish an air defense identification zone the construction of artificial islands Placing oil rigs in waters contested with Vietnam Preemptive rejection of the ruling by the permanent international court of arbitration over the Chinese dispute with the Philippines and of course numerous I think Annoying and potentially destabilizing dangerous actions at times by the Chinese military US and the rest of the region have responded in a variety of ways freedom of navigation military exercises new and enhanced defense partnerships Diplomacy mill-to-mill engagement with China But I would say that thus far none of these moves has really prevailed in terms of producing a course correction by the Chinese I Think that the China's rise in the Asia Pacific Raises two fundamental issues for the United States first How do we engage with Chinese initiatives that are additive for the region? But may marginalize either on purpose or not the United States So thinking about for example one belt one road Do we seek a way into these initiatives? Do we compete with them or do we simply ignore them and go about our business? And second on the security realm, I think we have to begin to think and I know a number of people here at the Naval War College Do this? What is the objective for the United States in the security realm over the long term? And how are our relative capabilities going to match up against those of the Chinese? Are we going to continue to aim for predominance? Are we going to try to create a system a grand bargain a system of trade-offs or you know mini-bargons? Over areas like Taiwan or Korea with the Chinese or are we going to eventually accept? You know so what some have proposed the spheres of influence and basically seed the Asia Pacific to China Which I'm clearly not recommending But I do think these are the kinds of ideas that are out there and I think we are going to have to grapple with them Seriously because China's rise in the region really does raise very basic questions of the sustainability of the current US role there China's rise has also been marked by a vast expanded global footprint Over the past decade or more of course China has gone far outside its borders to seek resources It is the largest consumer of many resources, you know 50% of all aluminum 45% of zinc and copper 30% of soy beans and you can pick your your resource and China is usually the largest consumer And in so doing it has exported labor it's exported capital so its economic footprint really is all throughout the world More recently as China's economy is shifting from investment led to consumption based and services economy We're seeing that China is now looking more toward advanced industrialized countries in Europe and certainly in the United States Seeking access to financial services Technology buying real estate So we should be expecting in the United States an increasing Engagement with China in terms of Chinese investment, which will raise some questions, which I'll come back to in a minute At the same time as China is expanding its global economic footprint. It's also expanding its global security footprint I think it quite rightly says that it wants to be able to protect its own people and its own assets throughout the world It has established its first logistics base in Djibouti And it's said that part of the reason behind that is is because of the Belt and Road initiative that it's going to you know serve a function in you know protecting its trade and assets there and and connectivity But I think if you read the Chinese analysts and scholars and what they're saying there's talk about more bases right there are those who say why shouldn't China have bases throughout the world and Most recently some scholars have talked about you know whether China should have allies, right? So why shouldn't China have a more formal system of alliances something akin to what the United States has and by the way Why couldn't China have some of the same allies that the United States has? So Xi Jinping has placed a lot of importance on the People's Liberation Army on strengthening the military And I think we're going to see a far more expanded role for China's military moving forward And we're going to need to start thinking ahead of the curve in terms of how that military and how it's the military's engagement with other Countries is going to begin to involve evolve Finally, I think Both the economic and the security footprint have been accompanied by a new push on the part of Xi Jinping in particular to Push China's political power and I think this is differentiated from his push to try to Develop Chinese soft power because really what Xi Jinping is doing is not actually exporting soft power Because I don't think that Xi Jinping has a good understanding of what soft power really is But what he's really doing is trying to control the political narrative outside of China's borders And I think this is happening through things like the Confucius Institutes It's happening through Chinese media companies purchasing Chinese language media in other countries It's happening through the establishment of Chinese think tanks within China and outside of China that are designed to counter The Western narrative as Xi Jinping puts it I think it happens through the denial of visas to foreign scholars who are critical of China So I think that there is a way that Xi Jinping is trying in fact to promulgate a Chinese narrative and a Chinese Sort of control of the Chinese political narrative outside his own borders The implications of China's expanding global footprint. I think the most important really is as I suggested that we need to start Thinking ahead of the curve. So for example in the economic realm Now we have a city's review process For you know to review Chinese purchases that might in some way affect our security interests But what happens when we have Chinese companies? Who begin not to buy technology directly but begin to invest in labs and universities? For example, I know the Chinese company that's going to it's planning to invest in MIT or Yale and begin to invest in basic Science or you know certain kinds of technologies that could have Significant defense applications. What is our control for that kind of Chinese investment? I think we are ill prepared for the variety of new ways in which Chinese economic actors are going to begin to engage with our Economy, how do we differentiate between a state-owned enterprise interests and a private enterprise interests in China when the Chinese Government says that it plans now or would like to take a stake of at least 1% in all major Chinese private enterprises So I think that's something we need to think about as I suggested I think in the Security realm China's expanded military presence, you know certainly has a lot of opportunity for the US anti piracy Afghanistan security in Afghanistan China already has significant peacekeeping forces, which are very supportive of global norms But again, what would a system of Chinese bases a system of Chinese allies actually mean for the United States? And finally, I think it is very difficult for us to respond to Chinese efforts to control the political narrative You know we pride ourselves on being an open society And we set ourselves out as a model and we have tended to believe that by modeling good behavior We will eventually you know win the game And it's not clear to me that that is the case For example, what do we think about Chinese entertainment companies Buying movie theaters film distribution companies So that soon entertainment doesn't have any mention of Tibet or human rights or June 4th So I just think we need to be sensitive. This is not to be enormously alarmist But just to give you a little bit of a flavor for the kinds of new Interactions that I think we're going to be having with China that we ought to at least be sensitive to Finally on the global governance front. She has made Xi Jinping has made I think quite clear That he wants China to play a large Significant role in establishing norms and institutions and there's a great Comment in a speech he made in 2014 Where he said that he wants China not only to contribute to writing the rules of the game But to construct the playgrounds on which the games are played I think we've had notable cooperation with China on issues like Ebola on climate change Iran But these are hard work. These this cooperation is hard work You know, there are always different equities at stake different priorities and different values I think there's also a difference between cooperation on pandemics And cooperation on things like climate change And I think it was we're looking forward some of the sort of critical issues that we're going to be looking at Cooperation on cyber right where our values sort of openness and having a multi-stakeholder approach Are quite different in fact diametrically opposed to the Chinese emphasis on a state-centered stakeholder approach and protection of sovereignty I also think China is a global power means that there's no issue that's off limits anymore So when I look at China in the Arctic for example China has been not China is now an observer On the Arctic Council. We are a member of the Arctic Council But China has begun to talk about itself as a polar power and that has a research Capacity in Shanghai of a thousand people working on Arctic issues He's talked about the Arctic as a global commons. I think gradually China is going to be pushing It's already doing a lot of joint investment and research actually with other Arctic countries Gradually China is going to make a push I think to become a member of the Arctic Council. Do we care? What do we think about this? I think these are the kinds of issues again that we need to look a little bit around the curve and be prepared So before I offer some thoughts and just some concluding thoughts about US policy Let me highlight two areas that I see of uncertainty In China today that that might alter or even perhaps derail the type of trajectory that I am suggesting The first would be a sustained a sustained slowdown in the Chinese economy. I would give this about a 50 50 Chance it's clear that economic reform is not proceeding as planned in China They're rising debt levels continue state-owned enterprise reform has stalled We have all the problems with state intervention that we saw in the stock market and currency over the past year certainly there is growing discontent among the multinationals both European and American that are doing business in China Roughly 75% have said that they feel less welcome today in China than they did last year and 25% moved some of their assets out of China over the past year It is becoming a less friendly and a much more challenging environment to do business I think the slowdown in the Chinese economy Has a couple of different potential implications certainly for social stability I think that's part of the reason the state-owned enterprise reform has stalled because they're afraid of laying off millions of workers But I think it could have implications for China's ability to project influence It could also as many people say lead to Growing nationalism right to a display of external strength to try to keep the waters at home calm Although I think we're already looking at a highly nationalistic China today So I think that's one thing that we want to bear in mind is this this possibility that the Chinese economy Has a sustained economic slowdown the second and I think less Disgust is the potential for a political backlash against Xi Jinping and this I might put at about a 10 to 15 percent chance You know she has aggregated Tremendous institutional power in China. I think as much not more power than any Chinese leaders since Mountedome, but it's not clear how much this institutional power is matched by actual support particularly within say the top 20 percent of the business Political official scholarly certainly certainly elite. I think his anti-corruption campaign as well as the political repression Have alienated Sizable portion of this elite and there's a lot of discussion of Conflict even within the standing committee of the Politburo over the direction that Xi Jinping is taking Taiwan and Hong Kong Clearly, there's enormous discontent in both those places I don't I'm not predicting a coup at the 19th Party Congress in 2017 But I don't think it's impossible that there might be some political pushback Against this very tough line that she is taking both at home and abroad So let me conclude now with just a couple of thoughts about US policy because I do think that Despite the fact that probably the overall tenor of my remarks has been To focus on the challenges that I think China Faces or it presents to us. I think there are also some positive some some positives and some opportunities First, I think the US can leverage Xi Jinping's ambition, you know with rights comes Responsibilities, I think we saw that very clearly in the case of Ebola where China's initial offer of support Was about a hundred fifty thousand dollars. It was less than Cuba's But the United States and the United Nations came together and we pushed China and to some extent shamed them Into making a pretty significant Effort I think there are efforts to build on our cooperation on climate change You know China has set out that it wants to be a leader in clean energy and green finance These are the kinds of things that where we can hold them accountable So as they develop the Asian infrastructure investment bank as they push forward with development Through the one belt one road We can hold China accountable for the types of investment the types of Resource development and infrastructure development that they make to ensure that it is environmentally sustainable I think we also need to be able to evaluate Chinese proposals judiciously There is after all a pretty big gap between the Asian infrastructure investment bank and an air defense Identification zone and I think there can be a tendency in the United States as Chinese proposals come fast and furiously You know with this Xi Jinping administration has been like an avalanche of proposals To not know how to react to be caught flat footed and to be defensive and to assume whatever is coming out of China Is necessarily in some way going to be bad for the United States? That's not the case. I mean we've called upon China to be a responsible stakeholder We've asked them to step up to the plate and when they do that as in the case of the AI IV We ought to be able to accept it again We don't have to join it, but we probably shouldn't attempt to develop a coalition to oppose it third I think And I you know This is a little bit perhaps not something that the US government does but it happens all around the US government I think we need to resist the temptation and it's a big temptation To put everything into the framework of US China competition So as someone who you know you just read a lot you can look at almost any Issue area whether it's clean energy or it's the issue of innovation or it's you know academic success and a report that's produced here or somewhere else Will almost inevitably place it in the in the context of a US China competition You know the Pew Foundation report on clean energy for example each year Will say China surpasses the United States or the United States surpasses China as a sort of the headline sometimes even almost the title of the report But what's the point of that? It's not what the report is about and yet we begin to develop I think a Mindset right that everything that is done our infrastructure is so much worse or their you know Educational system is so much worse or whatever it is that everything is placed in this comparative and competitive kind of framework even I think when we think about What's going on in the South China Sea today? There is this tendency to place it in this US versus China But if you look at what's taking place in the South China Sea and you see that you know Japan and India and Australia and Vietnam and all these different countries are doing exercises that don't necessarily Involve the United States and certainly don't involve China. It's not really all about the United States in China There's a lot of the rise of the rest that's taking place in the region And I think it would be helpful to us and helpful to the bilateral Relationship if we could just take the temperature down by not putting everything in this competitive framework Having said all that Let me say that that I think they're also you know There's some some some other actions we need to take and we need to work with our allies to push back When China does things that we don't like and this could be everything from things like you know When they pass a non-governmental law on foreign non-governmental organizations that will seriously undermine our capacity, you know in the capacity of Chinese civil society to work together or You know restrictions in business that require regulations on business that require them to transfer sensitive information in order to do business in China or Take what's going on in the South China Sea I think Oftentimes if we can form a concerted and united front with our allies and push back against the most egregious of the Chinese Actions or regulations you can get some moderation in Chinese behavior Finally I think you know the US must lead and there was the earlier question about the pivot or the rebalance As I said, it's easy to get into reactive mode with China because they're just constantly putting things out there They're always on the move both at home and abroad. It's a country that is in transition, right? So they're always passing new regulations and and new laws It's difficult to keep up But we also have to be sure that we're not only reacting to what it is that they're putting out there but that we are asserting our own interests and Perhaps making adjustments for what what it is that they're doing but also forcing them to adjust to us And I do think and I know there's a lot of criticism about the pivot and the rebalance But at least from my perspective, it's an absolutely Essential maybe the most important element of our policy toward China right now Because it really is an assertion at its heart I believe of a US interest in the region, you know interest in freedom of navigation in free trade through the TPP Right and through good governance through the kind of capacity building that we do in countries like me and Mar So I think you know, we need to Continue to push forward and to push our own initiatives and our own values and our own priorities Okay, so one last one last recommendation and this just harkens back to something I mentioned at the outset and that is again this capacity to think around the bend a little bit or to look around the bend And to pay attention to what Chinese scholars or Chinese officials are writing and saying Because the Chinese will often signal Intention a lot earlier than you start to see, you know, all the pieces come together It's a little bit like like a jigsaw puzzle, you know You hear something here and you read something there and then all the pieces start to come together and soon you have an entirely new Picture of what's going on in China and what China is doing We need to be able to to take our cues from you know Those little individual pieces and not wait until we have the picture already formed Because by then it's going to be too late for us to have a real chance to change it or affect it So let me conclude there I think we have about 10 minutes or so for questions still and I welcome any thoughts or comments or questions. Thank you Kevin Russell a US Army. We've talked a lot about grand strategy for the US, you know that big big key theme For our general direction on where we would like to go So as I listen to the presentation and I'm trying to come up with what would be our grand strategy For China, what do we say because if we say It's part of our grand strategy that we are for Democracy and open economies then it puts us absolute in contravention to China, which then automatically sets up this conflict So my question is how would we best frame? How we view China in our grand strategy, right? So Certainly, I don't think that there's you know any harm and the or anything that the Chinese should Get their backup about when it comes to saying, you know, we're we promote freedom of navigation and free trade I think what you're really talking about is is the democracy element of that and I think we can You know get around that by saying that, you know, we support the development of good governance, right? Transparency official accountability in the rule of law I mean we could say democracy because China says it is socialist democracy You know, whatever that really means But I think we're on pretty good ground in terms of dealing with China if we frame it in that in that way and You know, we have rule of law programs which now unfortunately are getting cut back in the current political environment But have been ongoing for you know a decade or more with the Chinese You know the rule of law is a central tenant of their political their own political reform platform under Xi Jinping You know, good governance official accountability. These are all things that I think can resonate in the Chinese System as well. So I think it's not that difficult to escape it if you're willing just to Translate democracy into some terms that are more acceptable to the Chinese today China is under the Controlling the Panama Canal They denied us the use of that canal What effect would that have on our country? China control the Panama Canal Actually hearing them. They have I can't hear what he's saying. Sorry. I don't think they control the Panama Canal, do they? I know I don't think they okay somebody I Well, and I think we would not be very happy about Chinese control over the Panama canal in terms of our you know trade with Latin America and You know, I think it would be a problem, but I I don't see that happening In the near future Bob behind US Navy. So with rising pluralism and aging demographic a Slowing economic growth are we perhaps reaching peak China in your future? So, yeah, the demographic issue is a serious one for China, you know in some cities such as Shanghai population Over 60 at this point is is 30% or 30% of the population in some of Chinese, you know Major cities is over 60 years old. They are quite concerned About it. I wouldn't say we're quite at the point of peak China I think you know what China is trying to do in terms of their economy Is shift it right again away from investment led growth and export led growth to services-based economy and They are trying in a variety of ways to promote innovation, right? You know the pouring money into R&D They are trying to loosen some of the educational restrictions to enable students to take time off And to go do startups, you know a lot of Chinese young people now want to do startups You know be the Jack next Jack Ma, you know, Alibaba I think you know if they can make the shift if they can make through this very difficult period of time If they can actually push through with the reforms and the state-owned enterprises, you know open up Sort of make rationalize their capital allocation. I think that there is potential that this is not yet This is not yet peak China They've also reformed their one-child policy. It hasn't yet Kicked into gear so that you can you know have two children but Yeah, it hasn't had quite the impact that they anticipated But over time it may help with the demographic challenge So I'm not quite prepared to say that that they've reached their moment in time and it's all downhill from there I think they still have a few tricks up their sleeve, but it's going to require Then pushing forward with the reform program they outlined back at the third plan of the 18th Party Congress in 2013 and not sort of You know moving backward from that point You've written very well on a number of subjects including the The environment and the pollution and the costs and how that can even push them backward You wrote that in the foreign affairs magazine and you've written a lot of things that are Centering on problems of China the thing that I would like to ask you doctor is if they had one problem Or two problems one would say well they'll work it through over time But there's a confluence of these problems the pollution gives them health care issues and health care concerns because the migration means They're not getting their claims Matt which means that they hoard money and how do you turn consumers into a consumer economy if they are hoarding because they're afraid So you got the environment and then you've got Corporations which you know Paulson and many other people and probably yourself would say look you got to wean them off of state control and At the same time they have really dangerous debt levels and Phenomenal over investment to deal with and there are three more and you know them better than I do So if you think about the confluence of those and you were to think of any country in the West that had those problems Even to a minor degree They couldn't do it So I'm not sure when you say to work through the reforms they're backed off the reforms because they're so scared that Communism is going to lose control And that is that paranoia will not go away How do you think it doesn't get far worse as? You know the fears of consumers the fears of the debt the bad banks and the list that you have You see an actual way other than do your homework try harder So I mean I guess I could say that You know if if Xi Jinping if the political leadership were I think I think the challenge now is that you're right Xi Jinping his his Basic a directive in his own mind is to clamp down on everything whether you clamp down on the economy You're clamping down on the political system right what it requires in my mind is you know Xi Jinping to be willing to to risk So maybe it's not as much doing your homework and hunkering down as being willing to Loosen the levers of control right loosen the levers of control over the economy loosen the levers of control over the political system somewhat because I think right now what he has is a rising middle class that is demonstrating every type of You know interest and value that rising middle classes have presented in every other country in the world right a desire for You know good education for their children for environmental protection for a health care system that works and he has yet to Deliver on any of them. I will say that one thing that he's not given credit for this leadership is not given credit For is when they came into power they did at least set out to address some of these hot-button political and social issues Right so he came when he came in yes, there was the anti-corruption campaign Yes, there was the political repression, but there was also this effort on the one-child policy on the environment On who co-reform on residency permit reform you could say that none of them has yet achieved It's objective none of the reforms has really come to fruition We're already four years in if this were the United States. He would not be reelected But it's not the United States And so he's probably got six more years to try to see these reforms through and to try to tinker and figure things out Which is why I think the potential for some kind of political pushback and some little bit of reform some some Moderation of his current policy might might be what What does the trick? You know having said all that I do tend to agree with you if this were a Western country Everybody would be looking at China and saying I mean would be looking and saying you know You are in desperate desperate straights. You're never going to get out of this But somehow China has this momentum of its own that you can't quite deny Okay. Thank you very much


This interdisciplinary course explores impacts, biases, and potential of technology to impact the world and solve global challenges. In this course you'll conduct research aimed at developing a theoretical understanding of the history and future of technology with full access to the NCSSM library resources. We'll discuss how access to technology influences the problems we as a society prioritize. We'll challenge some of the ideas that exist about how humans use technology focusing on the impactful use of technology to make the world a better place. We'll spend time exploring issues like AI and machine learning while defining some of the ways humans can use technological tools to solve global challenges.


Here comes the boss, a two-year-old Belgian Malinois who was now fighting drugs and crime at the Johnson County Sheriff's Department. He actually came originally from Mexico. We went and acquired him through Little Rock Canine in Little Rock, Arkansas. Boss has been in training down there for about three months. I spent the last two and a half weeks down there learning the commands and getting attached to the dog. As a dual-purpose dog, Boss can locate narcotics, track, and apprehend criminals. Sheriff Castle says in the short time he's been with the department, he's already made an impact on the community. This is actually his fourth day and we were called out yesterday morning, actually. And during the traffic stop, Boss did alert to the vehicle and we recovered crystal meth from the vehicle after his alert. So, yes, he's already been successful and he loves his job. He loves his work. At Pikeville Medical Center, we believe that together we can make a difference in the fight against cancer. We are proud to have patients who have experienced successful outcomes over many years. As always, we believe in the power of faith. Pikeville Medical Center, where cancer can be defeated. In the past, Johnson County sheriffs relied on other agencies' canines for fleeing subjects and location. However, with their own, they hope to make an even greater impact on the community. Drugs like everywhere else is a huge problem, but that's nationwide. And we have seen it ourselves here in Johnson County.  So, we are determined to make a difference to get these drugs off the street and that's what Sheriff Saylor plans on doing with this canine. For Mountain Top News, I'm Joel Korgel.


Hey everybody, it's Extension Today with Anna Kay, and today we're covering the Extension Hive to Honey Workshop. So let's go get busy. Going on here today. Yeah, so we are doing a Hive to Honey workshop here in Montgomery County, Alabama, and it is for the general public to come out and learn everything from how to raise bees, what it takes, what the life of a beekeeper looks like as well, and what you can do with their products, from the honey to the wax to the pollen and the benefits that it can give you. So people are coming out to learn and hopefully figure out how they can grow bees or plant for bees, maybe if they're neighbors a beekeeper, and it's just a fun way to learn. So get involved with your Extension office and come out to some garden programs because we're having them all over the state every day. Okay, so this is my most favorite part of these workshops. The food. The food. I'm excited too. Tell us about it. The Hive to Honey workshop is real important. Our details are so we're very detail-oriented. We have this beautiful blueberry arugula salad. Alexiammi. We have this fantastic vinaigrette honey. Is it sweetener as well with some Dijon mustard and olive oil. And then our crowning touch is going to be our pecans here. And then we have some violas, so flowers because we're master guards. Garners. We also have those brown cinnamon honey shortbread cookies. We have a honeycomb design as well as the honeybee design and I want you to try it. Let's go for it. I'll take the one with the honeycomb. Okay, I love cookies. So let's go. That is delicious. Okay, now that you've tried our honey cookie, I want you to wash it down with some of our wonderful honey lemonade. I'm so excited. This took us three hours of squeezing all of these lemons. Oh, so I bet it's delicious. Yes, it is fantastic. Oh, it already just looks good. Okay, I'm so excited, guys. So this has your fresh lemon, fresh lemon zest and then it has honey to sweeten it as well as some sparkling water and then some lime in it. This is amazing. Okay, guys, so now it's time for a little arts and crafts. We have a pollinator watering kit that I'm going to put together. So let's see if this goes without me breaking any glass in here. It is a pollinator station, so it'll attract butterflies and it'll also attract bees. So we're going to put a solution of water and salt about a gallon of water to about a teaspoon of salt. Right here is a plate. Inside the plate are several things that are going to allow the bee or butterfly to land on it and then they'll be able to crawl down and get them a little sip of water without drowning and then they'll be able to fly away. We don't want to drown them. We don't want to drown them. So these are not glued down so that you can take this and wash it and put them back in and put new fresh water in it. And then we're going to turn it over on your plate and let it sit there for about 24 hours to get really nice and glued down before we ever try to use it. Okay? Slow and steady. We're going to turn it over onto the bottom of our plate. We're going to try to center it. I'm going to help you out here. I'm thinking that this is going to be my mom's Mother's Day present so y'all really help me out. Glad to help. Okay, everybody, that wraps up this segment of Extension Today with Anna Kaye. And if you're curious about what kind of workshops are happening around you, make sure you check out our calendar at aces.edu.