„5G is going to be the nervous system of the society”

China, Asia, Europa, tehnologia, ordinea globală. Acestea au fost principalele teme abordate în cadrul discutiei la care au participat Denis Poltavets, neuropsihiatru și director de programe la Aspen Institute din Kiev, Dmitri Teperik, Director al think-tank-ului International Center for Defense and Security, Estonia, Iulia Lumină, Project Officer la Asia-Europe Foundation, Singapore, Jakub Klepal, director al think tank-ului Forum 2000 Foundation, Cehia, moderate de Ana Maria Luca , jurnalist și fellow al GlobalFocus Center din România.

În public, s-au aflat, printre alții, doamna Tamar Samash, fost ambasador al Israelului în Romania, și domnul Adrian Cioroianu, ambasador al României la UNESCO, care vor participa duminică, 28 iulie, de la ora 11AM,
la panelul „Diaspora, pamant romanesc„.

Iulia Lumină, about technology in Asia:
„There is a misconception that Asia is a wonderland of high-tech. The reality is that people have unequal access to technology and, overall, things are moving rather slowly.”

Denis Poltavets, about the humankind revolutions:
„People can digest all the technology we have now. We can dismiss the information we do not need and we can use our brains to extract information relevant for us.

Human beings, through their evolution, survived several revolutions, the agricultural, the industrial one, now we are surviving the informational revolutions, probably bio-tech revolution will follow. Personally, I am not worried about the informational revolution, but I am worried about the bio-tech revolution.

Dmitri Teperik, about Estonia and 5G:
„Estonia is optimistic regarding digital evolution. We even elect our Parliament via Internet.

5G is going to be the nervous system of the society. It is about Internet of Things, it is about Artificial Intelligence, it is about everything.”

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Dmitri Teperik, on China
„From 2011 to 2019, 90% of the espionage cases against US were originated in China.

We were too naive about Russia, but Russia is not as strong as China might be. We should not be naive about China either!

We should think about our national security. China proved that it is able to influence, by technology, countries in the neighborhood. The Chinese government announced that it is going to become technology independent in 2025.”

Denis Poltavets, on China:
„China makes no secret that it considers our liberal democracy and our way of life as a threat. Therefore, they want to project to the EU their way of life. They are more efficient, they obtain results easier, we debate a lot.

Europe’s culture is based on open dialogue, on discussion, on free thinking. This is not the case for China. This is probably why Europe and Western civilization are still ahead in terms of innovation.

We need to understand China more than we do. There are major differences between our culture and their culture. For instance, the value of human life. Or the value of personal freedoms. „

Jakub Klepal, about Chinese influence in the Czech Republic
„We cannot deny that the world is changing due to technology. We need to have rules to prevent technology taking control of our life. We have read many materials about Chinese provinces, for example, where technology is used to maintain political control and keep people away from thinking or doing things comfortable for the Government.

But we see this in Europe, too. We had in the Czech Republic a debate about Huawei. Governmental institutions were advised to revise their use of Huawei technology.

Just last week, other news informed that the Huawei branch in the Czech Republic was illegally gathering information about people in high profile positions.

China has some investments in the Czech Republic (a football club, a brewery, part of an airline, etc.) and they try to get into the political system by hiring some ex-politicians as lobbyists. These politicians made a big event from the visit of the president in China in Prague in 2016. People in the Czech Republic remembered the visits of the USSR presidents during communism. Now, according to a poll, 60% of the Czech people see China as a threat. A cold war mentality is spreading in Europe now.”

Iulia Lumină, on China
„We shouldn’t build a narrative in which China is using technology exclusively for malefic reasons.

People live in Chinese big cities pretty much how people live in major European or American cities.

Asia is still a place of major inequalities. Poor/rich is a major division, rural/urban is a division, not as big, though.

How much innovation do we need? What traditions should we keep?

Foto: Daniel Secărescu