What would it take for the current technology existed 30 years ago?

What would be the most plausible way for current technology to exist in the 80s / 90s?

What would it take for current technology to exist 30 years ago and now in 2020 you have 2050 technology?

Internet and smartphones at the level of now in 2020 in the early 2000s, for example?
 
An easy answer is to have the US reform to become a technology focused power, and generally have a much larger economy.

Begin by not passing the Immigration Act 1924 to allow tens of millions of Europeans to arrive in the US after 1924, largely from Italy, Germany and the Ukraine I'd imagine. Also reform the Chinese Exclusion Act to allow for for some Asian immigration, so that Asian Americans form around 10% of most western US states.

Also by the 1950s there should be the movement of hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans into the US. By 1960, the US population should be 230 million instead of 180 million IOTL. Anyway, continue this rapid immigration by encouraging economic and social integration to keep immigration population. Also, change American culture to become more focused on technology similar to Korea, Japan or even Germany.

Anyway, have a wealthier US build up much of Latin America. By 2020 make Brazil another Japan in terms of economy, population and technological output, and make Mexico another Germany, and make Argentina and Venezuela another UK and South Korea in terms of output.

By 2020 the American population should be around 505 million, and their output per person should be as large as Israel is today. That should be enough.
 
An easy answer is to have the US reform to become a technology focused power, and generally have a much larger economy.

Begin by not passing the Immigration Act 1924 to allow tens of millions of Europeans to arrive in the US after 1924, largely from Italy, Germany and the Ukraine I'd imagine. Also reform the Chinese Exclusion Act to allow for for some Asian immigration, so that Asian Americans form around 10% of most western US states.

Also by the 1950s there should be the movement of hundreds of thousands of Latin Americans into the US. By 1960, the US population should be 230 million instead of 180 million IOTL. Anyway, continue this rapid immigration by encouraging economic and social integration to keep immigration population. Also, change American culture to become more focused on technology similar to Korea, Japan or even Germany.

Anyway, have a wealthier US build up much of Latin America. By 2020 make Brazil another Japan in terms of economy, population and technological output, and make Mexico another Germany, and make Argentina and Venezuela another UK and South Korea in terms of output.

By 2020 the American population should be around 505 million, and their output per person should be as large as Israel is today. That should be enough.
And in this world could we still have the world wars, the Nazis and the cold war with the Soviet Union and the red China just like our timeline?
And in this world, how could India become what China is today and in addition to terms '' made in china '' terms also '' made in india ''?

And would Latin America be as developed as the USA, Japan and Europe? could we have brazil as a superpower or would it be just a power at the level of japan?
 
And in this world could we still have the world wars, the Nazis and the cold war with the Soviet Union and the red China just like our timeline?
And in this world, how could India become what China is today and in addition to terms '' made in china '' terms also '' made in india ''?

And would Latin America be as developed as the USA, Japan and Europe? could we have brazil as a superpower or would it be just a power at the level of japan?

Yeah I purposefully only changed the US rather than the entire world. Cold war probably helps technology as both sides can continue to compete in technology. One idea is a federal india, where one state introduces pro buisness pro industry laws and this is soon copied by many states to achieve a China like system in several parts of India.

And yeah it could be. Brazil won't be a superpower as it doesn't have the population for it. If it industrialises successfully in the period of 1945 to 1975 as Italy did, then it's population will be much smaller as birthrates drop dramatically, so that by 2020 there would be negative growth. By 2020 I don't see it having more than 150 million people at the very maximum, and it would probably be around 120 million, similar to Japan.
 
Julius Lilienfield secures his transistor patent in the mid-1920s and attracts capital. He makes friends with Robert Goddard, sympathizes with his situation, and helps Goddard get significant funding in the late 1920s. Goddard is able to produce a crude anti-tank missile and RATO system for carrier-launched aircraft, prompting limited military funding that continues to increase. Lilienfield develops and patents the transistor radio in 1930, his company continues growing despite the Depression. Goddard develops a series of rockets (N-Series ATL) equal to the German A2 by 1933 and another (P-Series ATL) equal to the German A3 in 1935. With help from Edwin Aldrin and a team of Cal-Tech researchers the idea of an ICBM in case of war with Europe is brought forth with poor reception but receives private funding from specific individuals and even from a few companies thinking to cash in if only on publicity from the ever-more-popular launches. Bell Labs eventually sees possibilities of high-altitude communications platforms (i.e. satellites) with the first satellite launch attempt in 1939 (via the S-Series ATL) but it fails miserably. The first successful satellite will in fact be a photographic reconaissance platform (spy satellite) on specifically calculated orbital trajectory in 1941 retrieved out of mid-air and controlled via ground stations. Wartime funding accelerates transistor-related development vastly agead of OTL such that by 1948 the average level of microelectronic technology looks more like OTL's late 1960s/early 1970s. A space race still occurs between the US and USSR but with a moon landing in the late 1950s and a Mars landing on July 4, 1969, pushing the technologies even farther.
 
But then we likely lack advances in other key areas, especially microelectronics. No WWI means likely no WWII so computers, spaceflight, lightweight alloys, almost anything involving nuclear technology, and a lot of medical technology (among others) develop more slowly or perhaps quite differently. Transistors are still likely but without the push of military cryptology etc. are likely much slower to develop, maybe 20-30 years slower.
 
But then we likely lack advances in other key areas, especially microelectronics. No WWI means likely no WWII so computers, spaceflight, lightweight alloys, almost anything involving nuclear technology, and a lot of medical technology (among others) develop more slowly or perhaps quite differently. Transistors are still likely but without the push of military cryptology etc. are likely much slower to develop, maybe 20-30 years slower.
Well let's no under appreciate the effects of a Europe that never has millions dead and has larger populations. How many potential inventors died in the war? Eastern Europe especially will be larger and wealthier in this world. I mean Russia without communism or WW2 would probably have double it's current population, likely more. Fair enough the USSR helped advance space technology, but the effects of having a consumer base of 300 million people by 2020 would probably be much larger. Industrial economies in the UK, Germany, Benelux will have tens of millions of more people by 2020 too. Austria-Hungary (if it survived, if not the area it was in) would have over 100 million people inventing, consuming and pushing technology forward. The US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand would also all have larger populations doing the same.

Also bear in mind that no WWs probably means earlier global shipping, and so places such as China could begin their expansion a decade earlier. This wealth grows exponentially to allow a far wealthier world. I think all of that definitely makes up for loss of technology.
 
But then we likely lack advances in other key areas, especially microelectronics. No WWI means likely no WWII so computers, spaceflight, lightweight alloys, almost anything involving nuclear technology, and a lot of medical technology (among others) develop more slowly or perhaps quite differently. Transistors are still likely but without the push of military cryptology etc. are likely much slower to develop, maybe 20-30 years slower.
agree to disagree
 
Well let's no under appreciate the effects of a Europe that never has millions dead and has larger populations. How many potential inventors died in the war? Eastern Europe especially will be larger and wealthier in this world. I mean Russia without communism or WW2 would probably have double it's current population, likely more. Fair enough the USSR helped advance space technology, but the effects of having a consumer base of 300 million people by 2020 would probably be much larger. Industrial economies in the UK, Germany, Benelux will have tens of millions of more people by 2020 too. Austria-Hungary (if it survived, if not the area it was in) would have over 100 million people inventing, consuming and pushing technology forward. The US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand would also all have larger populations doing the same.

Also bear in mind that no WWs probably means earlier global shipping, and so places such as China could begin their expansion a decade earlier. This wealth grows exponentially to allow a far wealthier world. I think all of that definitely makes up for loss of technology.
There's also the question of funding, especially for R&D. While there are purely civilian concepts brought to the market from the lab, often unless a government or monolithic corporate/government hybrid (Bell Labs) is involved, many of the great inventions if OTL might have floundered or be orphaned, especially if wealthy investors aren't easily sold on the idea. Lilienfield needed sponsors and better press - had he obtained these who knows where we would be today.
 
But then we likely lack advances in other key areas, especially microelectronics. No WWI means likely no WWII so computers, spaceflight, lightweight alloys, almost anything involving nuclear technology, and a lot of medical technology (among others) develop more slowly or perhaps quite differently. Transistors are still likely but without the push of military cryptology etc. are likely much slower to develop, maybe 20-30 years slower.
Europe and North America aren't fighting each other, and are still making significant advances in technology. War isn't necessary to for scientific advancement.
 
If anything wars mean that less government funding goes to civilian scientific advancements and that more private money gets invested in war bonds instead of propping up new companies or financing interesting research.
 
If anything wars mean that less government funding goes to civilian scientific advancements and that more private money gets invested in war bonds instead of propping up new companies or financing interesting research.

From what I noticed the ever division in the idea of war makes technology advance. On the one hand, war allows for the rapid incitement in advancing several areas to overcome the enemy, but on the other hand, war uses resources that could go to another area, and it has the potential to cause the death of people who would making discoveries, and also causes economic crisis and recession.

So for my scenario that the current technology has existed decades before, what is better we have the world wars and the cold war or we do not have them?
 
Europe and North America aren't fighting each other, and are still making significant advances in technology. War isn't necessary to for scientific advancement.
Wartime often facilitates development of newer technologies, peacetime often helps refine/mature existing ones.
 
Wartime often facilitates development of newer technologies, peacetime often helps refine/mature existing ones.
No, it's war that leads to short-term boosts in existing technologies. In wartime, you wan't new weapons and equipment right now - you don't have time to wait to invent a new one. It's peace that helps with long term scientific development, especially as it doesn't kill of a significant fraction of your military-aged population.
 
Yeah I purposefully only changed the US rather than the entire world. Cold war probably helps technology as both sides can continue to compete in technology. One idea is a federal india, where one state introduces pro buisness pro industry laws and this is soon copied by many states to achieve a China like system in several parts of India.

And yeah it could be. Brazil won't be a superpower as it doesn't have the population for it. If it industrialises successfully in the period of 1945 to 1975 as Italy did, then it's population will be much smaller as birthrates drop dramatically, so that by 2020 there would be negative growth. By 2020 I don't see it having more than 150 million people at the very maximum, and it would probably be around 120 million, similar to Japan.
India already is a federal state, and yet it never achieved industrialization on china's scale. For it to develop, it needs a different leadership not focused on socialist and import substitution policies, but open and free trading ones.
As for Brazil, for most of South American history, the states there have resented what they percieved to be the US's influence on their politics and policies, so I guess if Brazil industrializes, it does so on it's own accord
It's own
 
India already is a federal state, and yet it never achieved industrialization on china's scale. For it to develop, it needs a different leadership not focused on socialist and import substitution policies, but open and free trading ones.
Wow yeah don't know where i got that from. It is a bit sad because to see a higher standard of living you don't even need massively competent leadership, just one that allows more economic freedom.

But for a proper, well-rounded India I think they'd need more investment in agriculture after the green revolution, from roughly 1975 to 2020 to continue on the gains they made. It seems to me like more extensive and well maintained irrigation networks are essential, as are basic services such as roads in rural areas. Also I suggest they copy China's model of EEZs in major urban areas to facilitate industrial growth. By 2020, China is no longer competitive for wages and so India can take those fairly low skilled jobs if they have the right regulations for it. The English language would also help India out. I could easily see an India in 2020 with a GDP per capita of $4,000, with around 55% of it's population being urban and growing every year.
 

hammo1j

Donor
India already is a federal state, and yet it never achieved industrialization on china's scale. For it to develop, it needs it needs a different leadership not focused on socialist and import substitution policies, but open and free trading ones.

May we add to that the forcible abolition of the Caste system in the way that South Africa abolished apartheid or the US had a definite anti racial discrimination policy after the 1960's civil rights movement.
 
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