A Whole Bunch Of Big Technological Shocks

The Japanese Are Great At Inventing Complex Systems Of Rules, And Not So Great At Explaining Those Rules To Foreign Visitors.

The Human Propensity Is To Believe That Flukes Of Good Fortune Will Never Come To An End.

Compared With U.s. Cities, Japanese Cities Bend Over Backward To Help Foreigners. The Countryside Is Another Matter.

A Whole Bunch Of Big Technological Shocks Occurred When Asian Innovations - Paper, Gunpowder, The Stirrup, The Moldboard Plow And So On - Came To Europe Via The Silk Road.

Historically, Large-scale Global Trade Has Served Two Functions: 1) The Exchange Of Goods Between Willing Sellers And Buyers Described In Econ 101 Textbooks; 2) As A Tool Of State Aggrandizement, In Which The Private Parties Are Stand-ins For Governmental Interests.