Status Quo

Today, we see that everyone is talking about artificial intelligence. In particular, we are observing that major American technology companies such as Nvidia, Microsoft, Google, Apple, and Tesla are making very significant progress in this field. However, I believe there is one point that should never be overlooked: the fact that constant and massive amounts of real data are needed to develop artificial intelligence. Data is the number one raw material for improving the artificial intelligence systems being developed. While India has a larger population in this regard, it is behind China in terms of the society's technological adaptation. China appears to be in the most advantageous position with its large population and technology-adapted society. Of course, its reaching this state is not a coincidence or a miracle. It has a historical background. I would like to talk to you about this.

In his book The Rise of the Network Society, Manuel Castells, while describing the historical relationship between the Chinese state and technology, cites Joel Mokyr, who stated that in the 1400s, three hundred years before the industrial revolution in Europe, China was the most technologically advanced country in the world. Key inventions had been made in China centuries, or even fifteen hundred years, earlier. Developments such as the establishment of smelting furnaces that allowed for the tempering of iron in China in 200 B.C., the development of a water clock that worked more precisely than European mechanical clocks, the invention of the iron plow in the 6th century and its adaptation to rice cultivation in paddy fields two centuries later, the invention of the spinning wheel in the textile field in the 13th century at the same time as Europe, and the generation of power using water energy in the 8th century all took place. Especially in maritime affairs, they had started ocean voyages before the Europeans. They were using the compass in 960 A.D., and by the end of the 14th century, their ships were the most advanced in the world, capable of making long sea voyages. They had invented gunpowder, established a chemical industry to make better explosives, and had begun using crossbows and catapults centuries before Europe. In the field of medicine, they had developed the acupuncture method. Paper and printing, which can be defined as the first information processing revolution, were also Chinese inventions. Paper was used a thousand years before the West. Printing had also begun around the 7th century. In Europe, however, Gutenberg began using the printing press at the end of the 15th century. Despite all this, China could not industrialize like Europe. In fact, it was subjected to the colonial impositions of Britain with the Opium Wars in 1842, and it took a century for it to regain its independence.

So, why did a country that was so successful technologically fall into a colonial state? How did such a difference emerge between the China of the 1300s and the China of the 1800s, and why did it become stagnant technologically?

While there are many hypotheses regarding this, some explanations are very striking and cautionary. Mokyr believes that the Chinese state played a significant role in this backwardness and offers the following explanation: “After the 1400s, the Chinese state, under the rule of the Ming and Qing dynasties, lost interest in technological innovation. The elite segments focused on strengthening their own positions (the status quo) through art, humanities, and the “imperial bureaucracy.”

The role of the state and the focus of its policies changed; the state, which had established the agricultural expansion system by carrying out the greatest hydraulic engineering in history since the Han dynasty, later moved away from technological developments, even banned geographical discoveries, and by the 1430s, banned the construction of large-tonnage ships. This change occurred not only because of the rule of different dynasties but also because of the long-term dominance of the bureaucratic class.

According to Mokyr, the rulers feared the destructive potential of technological change on social stability (in other words, the status quo). The forces in China that opposed the spread of technology, especially urban guilds and bureaucrats satisfied with the status quo, were worried about the outbreak of social conflicts. Even K'ang-hsi and Ch'ien-lung of the Manchu dynasty in the 18th century focused on maintaining order rather than new development initiatives. External incentives for technological modernization decreased to almost nothing, and contacts with foreigners were seen as threatening.

All of this suggests that the state was a critical factor in China's technological decline. At one point, the Chinese state, thinking, “We are the most powerful country with the world's most advanced technologies. Instead of maintaining this and continuing to progress, let us preserve this situation,” fell into a regressive position against the advancing Europe and Japan. In other words, in a sense, it regressed while trying to preserve its advanced state, to protect the status quo.

We understand from this cautionary example that progress, development, and innovation must never stop. Falling behind while trying to preserve the status quo is inevitable.

The frequently used Turkish expression “don't invent new things” (icat çıkarma) is a very obvious example that expresses this erroneous approach.