Is Japan still considered the most advanced country in the world?

[pilman]

I remember that Japan was viewed in the 80's and 90's as vastly superior in regards to technology. I tend to notice this trend more among American otaku who generally praise Japan as the land of amazing technology that has and continues to surpass the rest of the world in regards to technology. I certainly know reading through various websites, youtube and other resources that there are certainly some amazing unique things about Japan such as the bullet train, toilets, arcade machines, vending machines, etc. I also remember for a period of time that Japanese flip phones dominated against American phones in regards to the features and screen displays yet were never really released to the US market. I used to envy the Japanese having access to such amazing tech and that our phones lagged behind.

I know Japanese automobiles are still viewed as very reliable and advanced, many Japanese electronics moreso components like capacitors and fabrication centers are generally viewed as quite advanced.

At the same time, I think that sometimes the world can be a bit harsh towards how much other countries contribute towards technology. I have nothing but respect for the Japanese work ethic, but when looking at some of the technology that's offered, wouldn't the tech merely be more concentrated due to Japans land mass compared to those of larger nations? How do areas of rural Japan compare in regards to the city/metropolitan areas? What are some things that Japan lacks in compared to other nations? This is a topic that's always fascinated me and as I plan out my trip to Asia, I really would like to observe some of the differences and advantages/disadvantages between different nations and the history behind this.

Electronics: I think most of this is now dominated by Taiwan/China but it seems that the US still has many semiconductor fabrication plants, however, Japan has 131 listed fab plants listed
https://www.investopedia.com/articl...ds-top-10-semiconductor-companies-tsmintc.asp
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_semiconductor_fabrication_plants

Transportation: I would say the United States is quite behind on trains, at one point this may have significantly differed while Europe and Asia absolutely take a lead but it appears the US still has a lead in Aerospace unless this has changed recently. Automobile wise, I know South Korea has really strengthened while driverless vehicles have been in development by Google for some time. Tesla also an American company while producing modern cars seem to be out of reach for most Americans due to their price.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aerospace_manufacturer
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automotive_industry

Chemical Production: Not my specialty but list of largest chemical producers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_chemical_producers

Architecture Firms: I was surprised to see how much the United States has contributed to international design, it appears that a chunk of the designs made here are built outside of the United States which I found interesting. Adrian Smith with a famous Chicago based architecture firm apparently built the Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_architecture_firms

I suppose I'm curious and interested how much has changed as I've been out of the loop for so long that I think we could have an interesting discussion about this.

 

[RyoHazuki84]

Considering Japans declining birth rate and population also declining as a result of the majority dying of old age, it is going to be difficult to maintain that position. As opposed to getting immigrants, Japan’s government just wants to increase tourism

 

[AXM]

Japan is funny.
In the same day I can take a train, buy stuff at a convenience store and pay for baseball tickets all with a touch IC card.
And then at work I have to send paper work by fax.
At home I have no dish washer, clothes dryer, cooking oven or central air con/heater. And thats the living standard for most apartments and houses.

If you ask me, the U.S has better household living standards in terms of appliances. I wish I could transplant the apartment I had in California to Japan. So does my Japanese wife. No matter how much I pay or how new the apartment is here in Japan, I can never have what I had in California here if I step into a real estate agency and ask for all the American standards I used to have.

The option I have is to do what one of my Japanese friends did who previously lived in California. He loved his living standard there so much that he built a house in Japan from the ground up in U.S Imperial measurements and into a fully functioning interior and exterior that is just like an American house. Dude even put a mail box on his front lawn.

And I also have other Japanese friends who lived in the U.S and now back in Japan. They all agree, America has it right when it comes to modern houses and apartments.
I live in a place built in 2005 but you would swear it was 1975.

And I've done alot of house hunting at Japanese model home neighborhoods. You have to pay a lot to reach American levels and you also have to buy the land itself which is sometimes just as much as the house depending on location.

So I just cry a little inside when I go home to California and see my friends apartments or town houses.
2 car garage in Japan? Good fucking luck.
1 car garage? Needle in a haystack.
If you're lucky, have fun keeping your car clean in it's open air car port in a country that never stops raining and polluted wind from China.

I could keep going. This is a passionate subject for me.

 

[pilman]

Japan is funny.
In the same day I can take a train, buy stuff at a convenience store and pay for baseball tickets all with a touch IC card.
And then at work I have to send paper work by fax.
At home I have no dish washer, clothes dryer, cooking oven or central air con/heater. And thats the living standard for most apartments and houses.

If you ask me, the U.S has better household living standards in terms of appliances. I wish I could transplant the apartment I had in California to Japan. So does my Japanese wife. No matter how much I pay or how new the apartment is here in Japan, I can never had what I had in California here if I step into a real estate agency and ask for all the American standards I used to have.

The option I have is to do what one of my Japanese friends did who previously lived in California. He loved his living standard there so much that he built a house in Japan from the ground up in U.S Imperial measurements and into a fully functioning interior and exterior that is just like an American house. Dude even put a mail box on his front lawn.

And I also have other Japanese friends who lived in the U.S and now back in Japan. They all agree, America has it right when it comes to modern houses and apartments.
I live in a place built in 2005 but you would swear it was 1975.

And I've done alot of house hunting at Japanese model home neighborhoods. You have to pay a lot to reach American levels and you also have to buy the land itself which is sometimes just as much as the house depending on location.

So I just cry a little inside when I go home to California and see my friends apartments or town houses.
2 car garage in Japan? good fucking luck. 1 car garage? lol needle in a hay stack. Have fun keeping your car clean in it's open air car port in a country that constantly rains.

I could keep going. This is a passionate subject for me.

I have heard about the appliance issues in Japan as well, I also recall hearing about lack of central heating in the homes.

A few other things in Japan maybe you can confirm, I have heard PCs are not really common in the home although from my understanding, NEC did manufacture a superior computing platform to the IBM Compatibles at one time. I have also heard that PC gaming never really took off in Japan like it did in Europe and the Americas. Apparently keyboards also were not common due to lack of support of thousands of Japanese keyboards but it caught on with cellphones more so for communication.

I have heard that bluetooth headsets are not commonly used in public but rather that Japanese in general will wear wired earbuds as the idea of talking in public will cause a mistaken appearance that the person is talking to themselves.

I figure maybe this isn't such much about the lack of availability or options in Japan but more the lack of mass consumer adoption despite the technology existing there already?

I tend to find in the US that some individuals feel the United States is far behind most of Asia in regards to technology but I wonder if maybe some things are being taken for granted or overlooked.

Some of the things I have noticed in the US, it seems that innovation for certain tech like driverless cars, tesla and apple and their electric vehicles, smart phones and tablets which the touchscreen phones really took off in the US from Apple and many innovations from Motorola, many of the major hardware manufacturers like intel, amd, qualcomm, western digital, nvidia.

This is just the tech industry and perhaps there is a stronger innovation to experiment with new things, I notice much of the tech being somewhat rehashed from earlier technology like virtual reality, 3D movies, etc.

I noticed that American tech is judged on where it is manufactured and there seems to be some strange policies in effect what is branded as "American". If I take out my Intel 3570k processor it says that it was made in Malaysia but further research shows this was only where the product was finished. Apparently the wafers are designed and made in fabrication centers in the United States and shipped overseas to cap the cut wafters, due to the assembly when they are shipped back, the country of origin shows where the final assembly took place. It seems that a significant amount of goods we associate as Chinese or even Japanese or Korean may not actually be from those countries. An iPhone while saying made in China contains various parts from the US ( at the time was using glass made in the US) while using many Korean components as well.

Example https://www.lifewire.com/where-is-the-iphone-made-1999503

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.ne...he-usa-computer-hardware-made-in-america/amp/

I opened up a Dreamcast that says made in Japan and was surprised to see almost all the components inside were made in China. I know even my Samsung Galaxy s8+ says made in China on the back yet inside the majority of the parts are Korean.

I am not sure if this is how individuals are associating technological progress defining a nation as a consumer/service nation compared to a manufacturing nation based on perception a product came from elsewhere. Something else I have noticed are some of the services in the US seem very uncommon outside of the US such as DNA ancestry testing kits, products like google glass despite failing due to controversy, tooling and industrial equipment, production based presentation like the EDM/Dance music festivals in San Francisco and Las Vegas etc etc.

I have to admit that when I saw Japan as a child, I imagined the land of neon signs, crystal clear colorful displays, robots and mechs, a fine attention to art, drawings and detail, and products that were vastly superior to their counterparts such as video games, electronic hardware, entertainment like japanese pro wrestling and mixed martial arts like Pride, Manga and Anime, superior cell phones, arcades, vending machines, cars, public transportation and trains, superior cameras.

Now I have more of a neutral view that some things Japan absolutely has the advantage to some tech related consumer products while also lacking perhaps in other things.

Having never visited Japan, I can only take a guess as to the perception vs the reality.

 

[Radar]

I remember there was an old documentary about Japanese computers

 

[RyoHazuki84]

I see people using Bluetooth all the time but I live in Yokohama but do a lot of more work in Tokyo. A majority of the country’s economies and technologies are focused on the big cities where you’ll find most of the those advances. But in the country side, you’re not going to have transportation services that are just as good as well as other technological marvels.

 

[DigitalDuck]

I stay with a friend in Japan every summer so the total number of Japanese houses I'm familiar with is exactly one, but there's a discrepancy here.

In my house I don't have a tumble dryer or dishwasher, so I never really looked for them or considered it strange not to have them when I stay with her. Also, because I stay in the summer, I don't notice or care about the lack of central heating.

She has air conditioners, though. Loads of them. And talking about it, "We don't really use these in the UK", she seemed almost baffled at the idea of not having them. So I'm curious when AXM mentions the lack of an air con - is it perhaps a regional thing? She lives in Shibukawa, Gunma - it gets very hot there, especially in July.

 

[RyoHazuki84]

The air conditioning isn’t insulated like it is in the US

 

[AXM]

@DigitalDuck
The discrepancy in household living standards between the U.S and U.K/Europe I can say also matches Japan. Except in your case with the U.K you live in a mostly cold and rainy country. Your idea of the hottest day on record in the U.K is 8 months out of the year in South Western U.S.

In Japan as I'm sure you have experienced, it's very hot and humid. That lasts for months and ya, your friend needs loads of air cons to keep cool. Ask your friend if she would like to have one central unit, hidden away in a closet that feeds cold/hot air to each and every room in the place through unobtrusive vents in the ceiling and watch her reaction.
"Oh you mean like in an expensive building? Who can afford that? Only commercial buildings use them."

Except this is the standard for nearly every modern home/apartment in the U.S, especially where I come from.
Even the cheapest of apartments in California have central air units, dish washers, kitchen sink garbage disposals, tumble dryers, large ovens and in some apartments, your own sealed car garage.
And then in a lot of apartments they provide other appliances such as microwave, fridge, 4 spot stove and washing machine. All free of charge or one time fee of like $100.
And don't get me started on security deposits and other start up costs in Japan. It's basically robbery. I'm talking thousands of dollars/pounds for no reason other than "key money" or "new tatami mats" or "thats just the way it is".
And any place you find that doesn't screw you over is basically a shit hole.

Imagine living to those American standards since the 80's but live in Japan in 2018 and not have any of that and on top of it pay through the ass to even get a quarter of what you had.
Japan and the U.K are first world countries but America is on another tier in these regards.

 

[hopeful]

Japan is still one of the most advanced country in the world. No doubt about that.

 

[DigitalDuck]

In Japan as I'm sure you have experienced, it's very hot and humid. That lasts for months and ya, your friend needs loads of air cons to keep cool. Ask your friend if she would like to have one central unit, hidden away in a closet that feeds cold/hot air to each and every room in the place through unobtrusive vents in the ceiling and watch her reaction.
"Oh you mean like in an expensive building? Who can afford that? Only commercial buildings use them."

Yeah, but that's pretty much my reaction too.

I do get what you're saying, though. But I think that's more "how America differs to other developed countries" than anything else...

 

[AXM]

Yeah, but that's pretty much my reaction too.

I do get what you're saying, though. But I think that's more "how America differs to other developed countries" than anything else...

Title of the thread is written "Is Japan still considered THE most advanced country in the world?"

My rebuttal is a strong NO when it comes to apartment/housing living standards for a great majority of the population.
And it never was. Probably never will be.

Japan is still a very OLD country. And a lot of that oldness Japanese people want to protect. Leaving the country in a perpetual state of modernizing around things that are literally falling apart.
Anyone who says otherwise has never lived in both America and Japan. You have to actually live here for a while to see just the degree to which the two countries defer.
Therefore, /thread when it comes to that aspect.

Otherwise when you do leave the house and go out into a major city. Japan>America in terms of tech/transportation conveniences.
So it all really depends on where and what you are doing.

I live in Fukuoka. Japans' 3rd or 4th major modern city, literally struggling driving my car around tiny streets avoiding people/bikes with houses/apartments falling apart and electric poles blocking half the street that are as old as time itself.
Meanwhie a bullet train going 320kmh with Wifi speeds past.

The country needs to make up it's mind sometimes. Either you bite the bullet, knock some old shit down and improve the country across the board, or continue in this state of "protecting " at the expense of modernizing and improving living standards.

Plenty of old historic areas in Japan. Not everywhere do we need "World Heritage Sites" for a fucking wooden bridge or tree.

 

[pilman]

Title of the thread is written "Is Japan still considered THE most advanced country in the world?"

My rebuttal is a strong no when it comes to apartment/housing living standards for a great majority of the population.
And it never was. Probably never will be.

Japan is still a very OLD country. And a lot of that oldness Japanese people want to protect. Leaving the country in a perpetual state of modernizing around things that are literally falling apart.
Anyone who says otherwise has never lived in both America and Japan. You have to actually live here for a while to see just the degree to which the two countries defer.
Therefore, /thread when it comes to that aspect.

Otherwise when you do leave the house and go out into a major city. Japan>America in terms of tech/transportation conveniences.
So it all really depends on where and what you are doing.

I live in Fukuoka. Japans' 3rd or 4th major modern city, literally struggling driving my car around tiny streets avoiding people/bikes with houses/apartments falling apart and electric poles blocking half the street that are as old as time itself.
Meanwhie a bullet train going 200kmh with Wifi speeds past.

Interesting way to describe it, so it sounds like city life/consumer products are absolutely amongst the most advanced but not necessarily housing/apartments. I am curious then as well how much time the average Japanese person spends at home?

Do the Japanese generally refer to home as primarily a place just to sleep? Or more than that?

I notice in the US there are a lot of homebodys, of course it depends on the location and area as well. If I were to go to NYC, most people cannot afford a house and a tiny studio apartment will set you back significantly but pay is higher. Then of course in the southern states, pay is not as good but you can get a home much cheaper than up north. My friend from Mexico says houses here in northern Florida are built poorly and not very sturdy. Up north where I grew up in Chicago, a significant number of homes were made of brick and a lot of that was codified after the great Chicago fire.

Regarding the bullet trains, are these innercity rail or more for long distance travel? How do the inner city trains compare?

 

[AXM]

Interesting way to describe it, so it sounds like city life/consumer products are absolutely amongst the most advanced but not necessarily housing/apartments. I am curious then as well how much time the average Japanese person spends at home?

Do the Japanese generally refer to home as primarily a place just to sleep? Or more than that?

I notice in the US there are a lot of homebodys, of course it depends on the location and area as well. If I were to go to NYC, most people cannot afford a house and a tiny studio apartment will set you back significantly but pay is higher. Then of course in the southern states, pay is not as good but you can get a home much cheaper than up north. My friend from Mexico says houses here in northern Florida are built poorly and not very sturdy. Up north where I grew up in Chicago, a significant number of homes were made of brick and a lot of that was codified after the great Chicago fire.

Regarding the bullet trains, are these innercity rail or more for long distance travel? How do the inner city trains compare?

Young single Japanese people living in a city like Tokyo/Osaka/Nagoya/Fukuoka usually have a studio apartment with a tiny kitchen. Probably around the size of 3-4 bed widths. And the kitchens (if you can even call them that) are a joke.
So most young people are always out, working/playing/drinking/shopping.

But plenty of homebodies and people with zero social skills stay in-doors.
Japan has probably the highest population of hermits or lock-ins. Some don't even have a real apartment. They hop from internet cafe cubicle to capsule hotel and back. All the while not talking to a soul.

To answer your question, Bullet Trains are meant for long distance. I once traveled from Southern Japan to Northern and back all via bullet train. Meanwhile inner-city trains like the one I take every day vary in speed depending on which one you get on.
Local aka slow, stopping at every stop.
Express aka. Fast, making limited stops.
Super Express aka. Fast as hell, rarely stopping until it reaches the city center.

Love the train systems here. Buses too. I never cringe at the thought of having to take a bus. It's clean, easy and efficient.
Japan does a good job with public trans. America, with good reason, is usually a mess in comparison. We are obsessed with cars being the answer to anywhere you need to go. Don't have a car? You're screwed. I hated that about America even though I am a car lover.

 

[SCQ]

That's a difficult question to answer, first we have to ask ourselves what defines "being the most technologically advanced nation in the world". If we're talking about innovation and research then it's America and has been for over half a century, there simply isn't a nation on earth that can put in the amount of resources the USA can in to technological research. If we are talking about infrastructure then Japan certainly has great infrastructure but considering that the country's population is largely concentrated in the same rather small area, it's a simpler task to achieve than for some other countries so it can be an unfair comparison, also the infrastructure outside of the Japanese megalopolis is satisfactory but aging and not really that impressive. Japanese technological products while usually good quality also often use american components, so even if a Japanese company releases a highly powerful computer or phone the components that actually make it powerful will be American. However Japan do dominate in certain areas like robotics and if I'm not mistaken nanotechnology, as well as being highly competitive in areas such as infrastructure and technology but I would the say that Japan being the most technologically advanced country on earth has always been an illusion created by their love of neon and their strong presence in the tech market. That's not to say that they don't dominate in certain areas, but overall they could never compare to the USA.

 

[pilman]

Young single Japanese people living in a city like Tokyo/Osaka/Nagoya/Fukuoka usually have a studio apartment with a tiny kitchen. Probably around the size of 3-4 bed widths. And the kitchens (if you can even call them that) are a joke.
So most young people are always out, working/playing/drinking/shopping.

But plenty of homebodies and people with zero social skills stay in-doors.
Japan has probably the highest population of hermits or lock-ins. Some don't even have a real apartment. They hop from internet cafe cubicle to capsule hotel and back. All the while not talking to a soul.

To answer your question, Bullet Trains are meant for long distance. I once traveled from Southern Japan to Northern and back all via bullet train. Meanwhile inner-city trains like the one I take every day vary in speed depending on which one you get on.
Local aka slow, stopping at every stop.
Express aka. Fast, making limited stops.
Super Express aka. Fast as hell, rarely stopping until it reaches the city center.

Love the train systems here. Buses too. I never cringe at the thought of having to take a bus. It's clean, easy and efficient.
Japan does a good job with public trans. America, with good reason, is usually a mess in comparison. We are obsessed with cars being the answer to anywhere you need to go. Don't have a car? You're screwed. I hated that about America even though I am a car lover.

Agreed about Americas public transport. I really like the concepts coming out from Tesla but its true that it is especially difficult to get around anywhere here.

Even in the Chicago suburbs, the only way to get to the city without waiting in traffic was taking Metra which traveled through the suburban areas. The inner city CTA was fantastic and generally on time but lot of slow areas due to the old stub terminals and the loop. The CTA is actually pretty nice and modern but the issue is that it doesn't cover large chunks of the south and west side of the city limits which you have to rely on buses and they are confusing.

Imagine moving to Rural Fl we dont even have amtrak. It flat out is just not a place for the young.

Probably an even more confusing system was when I was down in Bogota Colombia. They used a bus system which used train style terminals and had a dedicated line, kind of a pain figuring it out and how to get places. I asked my wife about the comparisons, I noticed some differences in her home. Smaller apartment with 3 bedrooms, kitchen, attic area. The biggest difference are the shower heads are electric and hook directly into the electricity outside that freaked me out at first. Its used to heat the water. Since Bogota tends to be cold, no one really has AC units and never noticed, most people just crack a window. I tend to be intrigued by little details like that.

The living standards...I think Americans can be very harsh on ourselves. I know someone here mentioned neon lights and I always associate then with Tokyo for some reason. I love neon lights and they were very common at one time. I think Las Vegas is the only place left that qualifies for a significant portion of neon, and at least the exteriors look pretty high tech but considering its a big tourist trap, hard to say.

I had my iPad 2 back in 2011 as soon as it came out, i remember people lookikg at this thing in amazement. 10 hr battery and I could skype with it, no idea how popular smart watches are there.

I think most of the things about Japan I associate be it out of ignorance is that Japan seems less individualistic and much more "follow the rules and for Japan". I notice things like handing a business card with two hands is a sign of respect, same with bowing, shoes ( which is common here too, no one wants filthy shoes in the house). I tend to notice eye contact differences towards the nose or lips rather than direct eye contact. While jot trchnology focused, more a cultural observation.

In regards to Japan tech, back in the flip phone days I would have done anything to get some of those sharp or fujitsu phones but you had to be a Japanese resident with a credit card..I used to get so jealous about that.I would see the best monitors, displays, cameras, video games, all of that coming out of Japan, even the stuff Yamaha produced like their keyboards and jetskis were made incredibly well. Never had issue with a Toyota, I just associated Japan as much more disciplined, focused and dedicated to doing the very best never compromising...of course here is where reality sets in, that appears to not be necessarily the case completely.

My Colombian wife had her perceptions of the United States that we all lived in skyscrapers, had disney land, were super rich with no poor people, she was surprised she finally came here.

 

[RyoHazuki84]

I remember the first time my Japanese wife visited my family in Arizona, she totally loved the dishwashers and the garbage disposal lol

 

[Jeff]

Japan is a shadow of it's former self. Not to say that it's really gone downhill, but others are surpassing them due to various reasons. Population, age, the Fukashima incident, competition from China and South Korea. Shenmue takes place in a time for Japan when it was booming and seen as a future superpower. Now that's not even a possibility. They still are a leader in technology, but they are in a tent with some others now. Not to mention that most of the tech you have is designed by American companies.

 

[Sonikku]

Japan is funny.
In the same day I can take a train, buy stuff at a convenience store and pay for baseball tickets all with a touch IC card.
And then at work I have to send paper work by fax.
At home I have no dish washer, clothes dryer, cooking oven or central air con/heater. And thats the living standard for most apartments and houses.

If you ask me, the U.S has better household living standards in terms of appliances. I wish I could transplant the apartment I had in California to Japan. So does my Japanese wife. No matter how much I pay or how new the apartment is here in Japan, I can never have what I had in California here if I step into a real estate agency and ask for all the American standards I used to have.

The option I have is to do what one of my Japanese friends did who previously lived in California. He loved his living standard there so much that he built a house in Japan from the ground up in U.S Imperial measurements and into a fully functioning interior and exterior that is just like an American house. Dude even put a mail box on his front lawn.

And I also have other Japanese friends who lived in the U.S and now back in Japan. They all agree, America has it right when it comes to modern houses and apartments.
I live in a place built in 2005 but you would swear it was 1975.

And I've done alot of house hunting at Japanese model home neighborhoods. You have to pay a lot to reach American levels and you also have to buy the land itself which is sometimes just as much as the house depending on location.

So I just cry a little inside when I go home to California and see my friends apartments or town houses.
2 car garage in Japan? Good fucking luck.
1 car garage? Needle in a haystack.
If you're lucky, have fun keeping your car clean in it's open air car port in a country that never stops raining and polluted wind from China.

I could keep going. This is a passionate subject for me.

Ironically, I've heard that China's government controlled media actually tells the people that all the pollution drifted there from America!

 

[AXM]

Japan is a shadow of it's former self. Not to say that it's really gone downhill, but others are surpassing them due to various reasons. Population, age, the Fukashima incident, competition from China and South Korea. Shenmue takes place in a time for Japan when it was booming and seen as a future superpower. Now that's not even a possibility. They still are a leader in technology, but they are in a tent with some others now. Not to mention that most of the tech you have is designed by American companies.

Jeff is actually spot on here.
Competition from China, Korea, U.S and Germany have sent Japan into a spending race to keep up.
Japan is broke as hell and while still a great place to live, you see how some things in Japan are just plain backwards or lacking.