Visualization of countries connecting each to their primary trade partners. The Soviet Bloc is on the top right.

:xi-gun: :deng-salute: :amerikkka: :corn-man-khrush: :stalin-gun-1: :stalin-gun-2:

Source

  • emizeko [they/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Flags were not available for countries in black

    they couldn't find a flag for the fucking USSR?

  • KermitTheFraud [they/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    This two-cluster pattern shows up because it’s a very socially stable configuration. I can’t remember the exact math, but I’ll try to remember the gist.

    You have a graph of nodes. For anyone who hasn’t gotten into graph theory, it’s not like a bar graph or line graph. It looks more like a network diagram. So you have nodes. These can represent people or countries or if you’re a mathematician, nothing in particular. Nodes can be connected by edges. You can color edges between nodes green to indicate those nodes have a friendly relationship or red for an unfriendly relationship. That’s our model for this particular problem.

    You can take any set of three nodes and it will make a triangle. If two edges of that triangle are green, that triangle is considered unstable (imagine how tense it can be when two people you’re friends with are fighting). Taking the entire graph and flipping relationships from good to bad or vice-versa randomly until the graph is stable will tend to create two clusters of nodes where all the nodes in the cluster like each other but hate all the nodes in the opposite cluster.

    • vccx [they/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I'm too dumb for this but thank you :blob-no-thoughts:

      :gold-communist:

    • LoudMuffin [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      bogpill me on graph theory

      my discrete math teacher was horrible

    • FunkyStuff [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      :kombucha-disgust: Dialectical Materialism
      :sicko-yes: Graph Theorism

  • LeninWalksTheWorld [any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Some takeaways from this:

    1. Get fucked colonialists (Portugal, 'Great' Br*tain, even France a little)

    2. Germany conquering Europe with loans instead of tanks lol

    3. China will be returning to her historical position as a great economic powerhouse, guided by communism, you love to see it :xi-clap:

    • crime [she/her, any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Germany conquering Europe with loans instead of tanks lol

      I wonder if anyone wrote about doing this :thinkin-lenin:

  • AFineWayToDie [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Not to be pedantic, but why is the USSR completely black? Did they not have their own flag? Or is it meant to represent the godless evil that dwelled within each and every one of their twisted black hearts?

    • bananon [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      It’s for countries that no longer exist. Yugoslavia, Belgium-Luxembourg, and the Yemens are also black.

    • Owl [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Somebody quickly compiled this with a data visualization library that had a flag representation for every currently-existing country, and couldn't be assed to figure out how to add historic countries to whatever library they were using.

  • disco [any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Where is China in the 1970 graph?

    • vccx [they/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Doesn't show up until 1980 as a node connected to Japan. China was almost completely isolated de-industrialized the for a long time.

      Looks like it's just the IMF shitting the bed with the data reporting though.

      https://twitter.com/sundellviz/status/1488598738037846016?s=20&t=NixHV437e6wzxvsCbMaO5Q

    • sooper_dooper_roofer [none/use name]
      ·
      3 years ago

      well most of that decline is due to the US cucking them hard (especially Japan in the Plaza Accords)

      Only in the last 20 years did China start benefitting from them

      • vccx [they/them]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Eggs meet basket :xi-pog: :covid-cool: :frothingfash:

        • CTHlurker [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          Yeah, but the UK managed to fuck themselves up just fine. So kinda both i guess?

        • vccx [they/them]
          ·
          3 years ago

          The USA tanked Japan's economy with legal fuckery to avoid one of their vassals running away with the consumer electronics industry. Japan's economy never recovered.

          The American ban on Huawei using Google Services (no Google Play Store or Google apps like Youtube on Huawei phones) and not being allowed to use 5G Qualcomm modems would be a good modern day example.

          Also similar to constant attempts by Americans to destroy DJI (DJI used to be 90% of the entire worldwide drone market, now 75%).

          • Fleewithme [none/use name]
            ·
            3 years ago

            The USA tanked Japan’s economy with legal fuckery to avoid one of their vassals running away with the consumer electronics industry. Japan’s economy never recovered.

            Really? I've never heard of this. Is it widely known?

  • hsv [none/use name]
    ·
    3 years ago

    Can't find Czechoslovakia or the GDR in the first graph. Am I blind or are they missing?

    • vccx [they/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      East Germany and Czechoslovakia show up here

      https://twitter.com/sundellviz/status/1488599320018436098?s=20&t=FM06P1-mJBULh3BP4_Rbow