well the moral of the story is:
SMOKING DOESN'T KILL YOU! hahaha.
Japan, Italy and France are all chain smoking countries.
*lights another marlboro*
I disagree with your view that East Asian cultures are homogenous. But we can disagree.
Just like I disagree how you said UC Berkeley is a top-2 school in the nation when it actually isn't even in the top 20 :)
I don't even know many firms which even recruit there :)
An interesting thing about Japan is that the elevated life expectancy is mostly for women. Just so you know, and you may find interesting, humans basically cannot live beyond 120-125 years old. While the life expectancy in general is rising, it's unlikely we'll ever be able to surpass this age. There are two theories: 1. our cells accumulate enough damage over the years that they wear out before then 2. our cells are specifically programmed to stop functioning before then.
"But, if China did have an equal standard of living (which it won't for a few centuries), I imagine the life expectancy would be higher because of almost free socialized medicine (uneven access to medical care is also what is keeping America behind Europe and Japan). (BTW, Japan has almost free medical care which is of good quality, but far behind the United States which has the highest quality in the world. The richest Japanese fly out to the US to have any sort of operations done. One of the main reasons for this is that US medical care is not socialized, thus doctors earn higher salaries, and the best doctors from all over the world go to the US to earn in a year what they would elsewhere in a couple years.)
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I don't agree with that. I would say that genetically east asians are just advantaged in this particular way. Look at Asians in their 30s and 40s, they still look incredibly young. Asian women have firm skin until their late 40's. Asian men still look like teenagers in their 20s and 30s. witness Caol Uno. Caucasians always look 10 years older than their actual age.
It's also no coincidence that the oldest person to have ever lived came from japan. Small, skinny and passive people will always live longer IMO.
It has medically proven that smaller dogs live longer than bigger dogs. Why wouldn't the same apply to humans?
"An interesting thing about Japan is that the elevated life expectancy is mostly for women. "
women always live longer than men. Also, it shouldn't be a coincidence that women are physically smaller and expend less energy.
"Just like I disagree how you said UC Berkeley is a top-2 school in the nation when it actually isn't even in the top 20 :) "
when did we talk about this? LOL.
Well, if you believe the US news and world report they are ranked 20. This takes into account the fact that UC berkeley has low living standards, poor hygiene and is overcrowded.
Academically, it is among the top in the nation. There are more nobel laureates in the berkley faculty now than any other school in the world.
It's not such a clear-cut issue of who is advantaged and who isn't. Asians have enormously high rates of osteoporosis.
I mean Northeast Asians. We have to be specific here since we are talking about populations. Southern Chinese are for these purposes grouped with Southeast Asians while Northern Chinese are grouped with Northeast Asians.
Whites have high-rates of osteoporosis as well. Blacks have almost no osteoporosis. A lot of this has to do with the very recent split between Northeast Asians and Europeans. The split occurred roughly 40,000 years ago. The split between (NE Asians+Europeans) and SE Asians occurred about 80,000 years ago. While the split between (NE Asians+Europeans+SE Asians) and sub-Saharran Africans occurred about 150,000 years ago.
These numbers change with new findings. But what is for certain, is that the split between NE Asians and Europeans (they weren't in Europe at the time, of course, but I'm trying to cut down on the jargon) occurred most recently.
Ricky MMA, are you a doctor or something? lol.
keep going, I'm learning something new.
It's not top in the nation. It's so easy to get in, the top firms won't even look at the students from there. It's not even in the top-2 in the state (Stanford and CalTech). (None of the firms I have worked for have ever hired from there.)
You mentioned it in a thread a few months back. I was going to chime in but never got around to it.
"women always live longer than men. Also, it shouldn't be a coincidence that women are physically smaller and expend less energy."
This is totally not true. Women have a higher life expectancy because of less unnatural deaths (war, suicides, etc.) but actually the woman's body goes into a serious decline post-menopause. It's nature's way of letting women know they are useless. Women abuse their bodies a lot less than men, they take less risky behavior, they're less likely to be killed, less likely to go to war, etc. Yet, after meno-pause they're a cancer magnet. They must be screened for breast and ovarian/uterine cancer every year. This is one of more interesting areas of cancer research, why women become so much more susceptible to cancer post-menopause.
I studied more years than I care to admit. I'm over the hill.
" Women abuse their bodies a lot less than men, they take less risky behavior, they're less likely to be killed, less likely to go to war,"
well it goes w/ my theory about being passive.
anyways, what you are saying only applies to Americans. In japan, there is not a big risk for males going to war or getting killed is there?
Japan has a very high suicide rate. Much higher than the US. There's also "karoshi" which is death from overwork. I'm not sure how often it actually happens, but they do mention it on the news frequently.
Women tend to stay home in Japan when they're married. Men go out drinking every night after work. Smoking. Not sleeping enough. I would imagine this would cause the difference in male/female rates.
A lot of the difference between the US/Japan stems from violence (Comptom for instance)and lack of access to medicine.
Japan does has crime. Only people who have never lived there don't know this. Women are groped on the subways all the time. In the US it would be considered sexual assault and reported. Not in Japan. Rape is not even reported most of the time. Guns are uncommon but people stab each other to death with knives. Financial crime is extremely common. Even the founder of K1 is currently in jail. Their level of violent crime is about the same as that of white America. It's the violent minority urban areas in the US which have social planners trying to find solutions. I hope they do find a solution since the problem is quite severe.
Here is a read on karoshi:
http://www.apmforum.com/columns/boye51.htm
If you have time in your career, I suggest you work a year in China, Japan, Korea, France, England, Spain, and the US. As many as you can. You'll realize just how miserable life is in China, Japan, and Korea when you're working 100 hours a week (I'm talking about a prestigious white-collar job). Europe is the best place to work. 6 weeks of vacations a year and 35 hours a week? Can't beat that.
"Koreans are considered "generally up to no good." "
then it´s better these days, when I lived in Japan 7-8 years ago, calling someone 'Kankokujin' was considered really really rude. You could get into a fight over it.
"For a full list of countries in ranking order click here . "
and LMFAO @ when EvilYoshida thinks he has bluename powers!
Korean actors are getting enormously popular in Japan. Especially, an actor named Pe Yong Jun (the main character of "Winter Sonata", which was aired in Japan last year) is a superstar in Japan. Already, 7 photo books about him have been published. When Tom Cruise came to Japan to promote Last Samurai, 500 women rushed to the airport. When Pe Yong Jun (age 31) came to Haneda Airport, 5000 women between age 12 and 85 rushed and converged to the airport terminal pushing and pressing against each other. In the midst of the chaos, 2 women (age 85) in the crowd fainted and were carried out on a stretcher to a nearby hospital. My mother, age 71, is also crazy about this actor. She watched Winter Sonata, and started to study Korean last year. The word "kankokujin" simply means "a Korean". It is not rude at all.
"The word "kankokujin" simply means "a Korean". It is not rude at all."
I know what it means and when I lived there it was considered an insult. I lived more on the countryside though..
I said that Holland has the best kick-boxers. The "etc. etc. etc." was a referral of how every nation has their respective strengths (i.e.- boxer = west, judo = Europe, etc.)
my position is a mix of Yoshida's and Ricky's.
China had a lot of theories of mathematics before Europe did. You don't get that by chance. Chinese logic is like Indian logic though...
Buddhism in Japan was introduced by Korea, but following that Japan went to China and imported several systems from there (and yes, Zen isn't that popular, but it sure is famous). However, Buddhism in China is very different from what Buddhism in India is/was. The Chinese changed it for 500 years before they finally accepted it and made it their own.
While the first true Japanese literary books were in Hiragana (and thus, written by women), EY is right in saying that Kanji was predominately used before the Meiji restoration. Heck, the didn't really use Katakana all that much before then, and was it marked for "foreign--ie. non Chinese" words before the Meiji era? Books from back then are basically pure Kanji though (and boy, did they know a lot of them).
Calling someone Korean can be insulting. Really depends on who you call Korean. The younger crowd is a lot different than their parents. I agree that a lot of Japanese girls aren't that pretty, but that they are good at make-up and fashion. However, the pretty ones are very pretty IMO. But that is true of any "race". I'm in Vancouver now, and some of the girls of South Asian descent are beyond smoking (SO amazing)! Even my girlfriend finds them attractive (I'm of South Asian descent, my girlfriend isn't).
One of the reasons behind Japanese stomach cancer was also thought to be the drinking/eating of ridiculously steam-hot food and tea (ie. ramen and green tea). That's interesting that there was another reason cited in this thread, thanks.
The size difference betweeen Japanese and American people is being exaggerated here I think. I mean, I'm about 5'10 170lbs, and I met a lot of guys there who were bigger than me. Which is true of wherever I go. Right now, Japan has the reigning world champ at 100kg, 100+, and Open. In 1999 they had all 3 as well. In fact, if you look at the results of the world championships and Olympics since they started (late 50s/mid 60s) you'll see that Japan has been more consistent at HW than at the lighter weights. I always thought that was neat. I'll do a breakdown of it after work on this thread.
Sothy,
I never knew you were South Asian. Interesting...
About pre-Meiji use of kanji, I agree completely. However it was used in a system which incorporated Kanji and Hiragana simultaneously - much like our present system. The earliest book, Tale of Genji, was written purely in Hiragana because women were not educated in Kanji at the time. Even though that book was written in Kana, Kanji was considered the dominant mode of writing at the time for men. A lot of the time you see documents written purely in Kanji, these are written in Classical Japanese, which is basically Classical Chinese, which had little relation to spoken Japanese of the time (or spoken Chinese of today).
I'm not sure that the younger generation is much different than the older generation when it comes to ethnic and racial slurs. A lot of it is just a faux open-mindedness, which quickly erodes once they graduate from college and enter the real world. Soon that blond or brown hair is dyed black and cut short; the trendy clothes are replaced with more serious styles; the older mindset replaces any openmindedness they may have acquired in college. You can tell how slowly it is changing by their reluctance to grant citizenship to Japanese-born Koreans. While on the other hand, some Finnish-immigrant was elected to parliament.
Polished rice is now considered to be the main cause. If they just replaced polished rice with brown (unpolished) rice, they could add an extra couple of years to their life expectancy.
Sure they have the top 3 because of 2003 and they also did in 1999. But if you read my post, you'll see I mentioned during the 90's. We'll take a look at -100, +100, and Open.
1991: Japan, USSR, France 1/3
1992: ex-USSR, Hungary 0/2
1993: Poland, France, Hungary 0/3
1995: France, France, Poland 0/3
1996: France, Poland 0/2
1997: Poland, France, Poland 0/3
1999: Japan, Japan, Japan 3/3
2000: France, Japan 1/2
2001: ex-USSR, ex-USSR, Japan 1/3
So for this 10 year period, in light-heavyweight and heavyweight, Japan won 6 out of a possible 24. Meanwhile France won 7, USSR/ex-USSR won 4, and Poland won 5.
Looking at it from a different perspective: Japan won 6 while Europe won 18.
What is more extraordinary is that from 1992 to 1997 (1992, 1993, 1995, 1996, and 1997) Japan was unable to win a single gold in light-heavy, heavy, and Open.
Japan came back strong in 1999, only to win only 1 in 2001, and to come back strong again in 2003. It's up in the air how well the Japanese lightheavyweights and heavyweights will fare this summer in Athens.