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ScienceNet readers have heard me talk about T. Freidman, the NYTimes columnist whom Irecommend. Now I wish to recommend another columnist Fareed Zakaria on TIMEmagazine and on CNN. In a way, I am even more tuned-in to Zakaria since he andI have similar backgrounds – we are both immigrants who left home (he fromIndia and I from China) when young to come to the US for study in undergraduatecolleges, we both choose to remain in the US, become citizens by choice, and recevied our ph.d from Harvard. Inthis sense we have viewpoints that are bi-cultural and perhaps moreinternational and less nationalistic.

Thelatest book by Zakaria, The Post-AmericanWorld release 2.0, is a most enjoyable read. In it, Zakaria talk about thethree waves of human developments. First the Renaissance and the rise ofEuropean power; the second, the American century; and now the Rise of the Rest,in particular China and India. There is also a fasinating and rather fair comparison of China and India.

Inscience and technology, there are people who make and discover major advances,and there are popularizers who make complex S&T understandable to thepublic. Both are important contributors. Similarly in world affairs, there arestatesman and leaders who make history, and there are commentators who make thecomplex world understandable to us. Friedman and Zakaria, in my opinion, arethe best of this genre. They command data and statistics, synthesize disparateand related facts, and weave a viewpoint of the world not often seen orappreciated by common folks.

Idon’t know to what extent TIME and CNN are available in China. But I am surethe above mentioned book is not censored. It is definitely worth reading.